The answer is the criticality of the database to business operations. This factor receives the highest weight because inherent risk level factors are assessed without considering existing controls, and business criticality directly determines the potential impact of a failure—here, a database outage would disrupt multiple applications, causing severe operational and financial damage. On the CRISC exam, this tests your understanding that inherent risk is a function of impact and likelihood before any mitigation, and a common trap is to focus on the lack of a failover (a control gap) rather than the consequence itself. Remember, inherent risk is about the raw worst-case scenario; controls are irrelevant at this stage. A useful memory tip is “impact before controls”—always ask what happens if the asset fails, not how you protect it.
CRISC IT Risk Assessment Practice Question
This CRISC practice question tests your understanding of it risk assessment. The scenario asks you to isolate a root cause — eliminate options that address a different problem before choosing. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
During a risk assessment, the risk practitioner discovers that a critical database does not have an active failover solution. The database is used by multiple business applications. Which of the following factors should be given the HIGHEST weight when determining the inherent risk level?
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
The criticality of the database to business operations
The inherent risk level is determined by the potential impact and likelihood of a threat exploiting a vulnerability, without considering controls. The criticality of the database to business operations directly drives the impact severity—if the database fails, multiple business applications could be disrupted, leading to significant operational and financial damage. This makes option A the highest-weighted factor because it defines the worst-case consequence, which is the foundation of inherent risk.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
✓
The criticality of the database to business operations
Why this is correct
Inherent risk is based on the asset's value and exposure; business criticality determines impact.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
✗
The number of existing compensating controls
Why it's wrong here
Compensating controls affect residual risk, not inherent risk.
✗
The frequency of vulnerability scans
Why it's wrong here
This is a control activity, not a factor for inherent risk.
✗
The cost to restore the database from backup
Why it's wrong here
While related to impact, it is a subset; overall business criticality is broader.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
The trap here is that candidates confuse inherent risk with residual risk, and incorrectly weigh compensating controls or recovery costs as primary factors for inherent risk, when they only apply after controls are considered.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
Inherent risk is calculated as the product of the likelihood of a threat event and the magnitude of impact, assuming no controls. For a critical database without failover, the impact magnitude is directly tied to business criticality—if the database is a single point of failure for multiple applications, the maximum tolerable downtime (MTD) is low, and the business impact analysis (BIA) would assign a high criticality rating. This is distinct from recovery cost, which is a post-incident metric used in cost-benefit analysis for controls like backups or failover clusters.
KKey Concepts to Remember
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
Find the constraint that changes the correct option.
Eliminate answers that are true in general but not in this case.
TExam Day Tips
→Watch for words such as best, first, most likely and least administrative effort.
→Review why wrong options are wrong, not only why the correct option is correct.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
How this comes up in practice
A practitioner preparing for the CRISC exam encounters this exact type of scenario on the job. The correct answer here is not the most general option — it is the best answer for the specific constraint described. Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option. Real exam questions reward reading the full scenario before eliminating options, because the constraint defines which answer fits.
What to study next
Got this wrong? Here's your next step.
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
IT Risk Assessment — This question tests IT Risk Assessment — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: The criticality of the database to business operations — The inherent risk level is determined by the potential impact and likelihood of a threat exploiting a vulnerability, without considering controls. The criticality of the database to business operations directly drives the impact severity—if the database fails, multiple business applications could be disrupted, leading to significant operational and financial damage. This makes option A the highest-weighted factor because it defines the worst-case consequence, which is the foundation of inherent risk.
What should I do if I get this CRISC question wrong?
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
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Question Discussion
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