ISC2 Certified in Cybersecurity (CC)Business Continuity (BC), Disaster Recovery (DR) & Incident Response (IR) ConceptsHard
During the planning phase for business continuity, an organization defines the maximum time a business process can be inoperative before the disruption causes unacceptable damage to the organization. This critical metric is known as:
- ARecovery Time Objective (RTO)
- BMaximum Tolerable Downtime (MTD)
- CRecovery Point Objective (RPO)
- DService Level Agreement (SLA)
Show answer & explanationAnswer & explanation
Correct answer: B. Maximum Tolerable Downtime (MTD)
Maximum Tolerable Downtime (MTD), also known as Maximum Period of Disruption (MPD), is the total amount of time a business process can be down before the organization experiences unacceptable consequences. It is the absolute limit for recovery, encompassing RTO and any subsequent work recovery time.
Why the other options are wrong
- A. RTO is the target time for restoring a function, not the absolute maximum tolerable outage.
- C. RPO defines acceptable data loss, not the duration of downtime.
- D. SLA is an agreement defining service performance, not an internal metric for tolerable downtime.
Maximum Tolerable Downtime (MTD)
The total amount of time a business process, system, or function can be inoperative before the organization suffers unacceptable, irreversible consequences.
- Also known as Maximum Period of Disruption (MPD).
- Determined by a Business Impact Analysis (BIA).
- Encompasses both RTO and Work Recovery Time (WRT).
Memory trick: MTD: The 'Maximum' time you Can't Function without major trouble.