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CRISC Practice Question: Is conducting a business impact analysis (BIA)…
An organization is conducting a business impact analysis (BIA) for its core banking system. Which of the following is the PRIMARY metric used to determine the urgency of recovery?
⚠ Common exam trap
A common mix-up: candidates confuse RTO with MTD: candidates often pick RTO because it directly relates to recovery speed, but MTD is the business-driven ceiling that defines the urgency, while RTO is merely a derived target.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Maximum Tolerable Downtime (MTD)
The Maximum Tolerable Downtime (MTD) is the primary metric for determining the urgency of recovery because it defines the total duration a business process can be unavailable before causing irreparable harm. For a core banking system, MTD directly reflects the maximum acceptable outage period from the business perspective, driving all recovery planning priorities.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Service Level Agreement (SLA)
Why it's wrong here
SLA is a contractual commitment, not a BIA metric.
- ✗
Recovery Time Objective (RTO)
Why it's wrong here
RTO is the target time for recovery, not the maximum allowable.
- ✓
Maximum Tolerable Downtime (MTD)
Why this is correct
MTD defines the maximum acceptable downtime before severe impact.
- ✗
Recovery Point Objective (RPO)
Why it's wrong here
RPO defines acceptable data loss, not recovery urgency.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This CRISC practice question is part of Courseiva's free ISACA certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the CRISC exam.