ISC2 CC Business Continuity, DR & Incident Response Practice Question
A multinational financial services organization operates three data centers in different geographic regions. Each data center runs a mix of critical and non-critical applications. The DR plan specifies Recovery Time Objectives (RTOs) ranging from 4 hours for critical applications to 72 hours for non-critical. During a scheduled DR test, the team attempts to fail over the primary customer database to the secondary site. The failover fails because the replication link between sites was saturated due to a large data synchronization job running concurrently. The test is declared a failure, and senior management is concerned about the DR plan's reliability. The IT director suggests increasing bandwidth between sites. The security architect proposes implementing network prioritization for replication traffic. The business continuity manager recommends revising the RTOs to be more realistic based on current bandwidth. The system administrator thinks the issue will resolve if the test is repeated during off-peak hours. Which of the following is the BEST course of action to address the root cause of the failure?
⚠ Common exam trap
ISC2 often tests the misconception that simply adding more bandwidth (Option B) solves all congestion issues, but the trap is that without traffic prioritization, the root cause of contention between different traffic types remains unaddressed.
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
✓
Implement Quality of Service (QoS) policies to prioritize database replication traffic over other data transfers.
The root cause is that the replication link was saturated by a large data synchronization job, which delayed the critical database replication traffic needed to meet the 4-hour RTO. Implementing Quality of Service (QoS) policies directly addresses this by prioritizing database replication traffic over other data transfers, ensuring that critical replication gets the necessary bandwidth even during concurrent large jobs. This is the most effective solution because it resolves the contention without requiring additional bandwidth or changing RTOs.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Implement Quality of Service (QoS) policies to prioritize database replication traffic over other data transfers.
Why this is correct
QoS ensures that critical DR replication traffic gets sufficient bandwidth, preventing saturation by low-priority jobs.
- ✗
Increase the bandwidth on the replication link by ordering a faster circuit from the ISP.
Why it's wrong here
Increasing bandwidth may help but does not prevent future scheduling conflicts; it is a costly and temporary fix.
- ✗
Reschedule the next DR test to occur during a scheduled maintenance window with no other replication activity.
Why it's wrong here
Rescheduling avoids the conflict but does not prevent it from happening during an actual disaster.
- ✗
Revise the RTO for the customer database from 4 hours to 8 hours to account for current bandwidth limitations.
Why it's wrong here
Changing RTOs is a business decision but does not fix the technical failure; it merely adjusts expectations.
Visual reference
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Related to this question
Learn chapter
Introduction to Security Principles
Key term
Failover
Failover is the automatic switching to a backup system when the primary system fails, ensuring continuous operation and minimal downtime.
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 by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
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.