ISC2 CC Practice Question: Business Continuity, Disaster Recovery, and Incident Response
A hospital's electronic health record (EHR) system must be available 24/7. The disaster recovery plan specifies an RTO of 4 hours and an RPO of 1 hour. Which combination of backup and site strategy best meets these objectives?
⚠ Common exam trap
CC often tests RTO/RPO by pairing them with site types — the trap is that candidates pick a cheaper site (warm/cold) that fails the strict RTO, or a backup frequency that fails the RPO.
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
✓
Hot site with continuous data replication
A hot site with continuous data replication best meets an RTO of 4 hours and RPO of 1 hour because a hot site is a fully operational duplicate facility that can take over almost immediately, and continuous replication keeps data loss well under 1 hour. This combination provides the lowest recovery time and data loss, aligning with the hospital's 24/7 availability requirement.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Cloud-based recovery with daily snapshots
Why it's wrong here
Daily snapshots leave up to 24 hours of data loss, exceeding the one-hour RPO, even though cloud recovery can meet the four-hour RTO. It is tempting because cloud-based recovery is fast and cost-effective, and would be correct if the RPO were 24 hours rather than one.
- ✗
Warm site with weekly full backups
Why it's wrong here
Weekly full backups leave up to seven days of data loss, breaching the one-hour RPO, and a warm site's manual restore typically exceeds four hours. It is tempting because a warm site is cheaper than hot standby, and would suit a looser RPO measured in days.
- ✓
Hot site with continuous data replication
Why this is correct
Continuous replication keeps the standby site within minutes of the primary, comfortably satisfying the one-hour RPO, while a hot site runs pre-provisioned infrastructure ready to take over well inside the four-hour RTO. For a 24/7 EHR, this pairing is the only one meeting both recovery objectives simultaneously.
- ✗
Cold site with daily full backups
Why it's wrong here
A cold site requires hardware provisioning and full restoration, so recovery far exceeds the four-hour RTO, and daily full backups breach the one-hour RPO. It is tempting because it is the cheapest standby option, and would suit a non-critical system with an RTO measured in days.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery
Key term
Availability
Availability is the measure of how often a system or service is operational and accessible when needed, typically expressed as a percentage of uptime.
Key term
Recovery
Recovery is the process of restoring systems, data, and operations after a security incident, failure, or disaster to return to normal functioning.
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JA
Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official ISC2 exam blueprint
This CC practice question is part of Courseiva's free ISC2 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 CC exam.