What is Availability?
Availability is the ability to access data, systems, or services when needed, without delay or disruption. It’s one of the three pillars of the CIA Triad in cybersecurity: Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability.
In short, availability ensures that critical information and systems remain operational and accessible to authorized users, whether for everyday business, decision-making, or recovery after a disruption.
Why Availability Matters
In today’s digital business environment, downtime isn’t just inconvenient – it’s costly. Without strong availability measures, organizations risk:
- Interruptions to critical services
- Productivity losses due to inaccessible data or applications
- Missed deadlines or service level agreement (SLA) violations
- Loss of customer trust or revenue
- Regulatory non-compliance if essential systems aren’t resilient
Availability is essential for business continuity, especially in industries like healthcare, finance, manufacturing, and public services.
Common Threats to Availability
- Cyberattacks: Ransomware, DDoS attacks, or malicious insiders
- Hardware or infrastructure failure: Damaged servers, power outages
- Network disruptions: ISP issues, misconfigured routers, or signal interference
- Human error: Unintentional deletion, misconfigurations, or mishandled updates
- Natural disasters: Fires, floods, earthquakes impacting physical infrastructure
How Availability is Maintained
- High-Availability Configurations: Duplicate systems, servers, or network paths to keep services running even if one component fails
- Data Backup and Recovery: Regular, secure backups and clear restoration procedures in case of data loss or corruption
- Failover Systems: Automatic switching to a standby system or server if the primary system fails
- Monitoring and Alerts: Real-time detection of performance issues or system downtime, with fast incident response
- Access Management: Ensuring only authorized users can access resources, even during high-risk periods
Availability vs. Reliability
Concept | Focus |
|---|---|
Availability | Is the system accessible when needed? |
Reliability | Does the system perform consistently over time? |
Both are critical for a resilient digital infrastructure.
How Fasoo Helps You Maintain Secure Availability
Fasoo’s data security platform ensures that your sensitive information stays secure, available, and usable – even during disruption, downtime, or data loss. Through a data-centric approach, Fasoo enables resilient access without compromising security or compliance.
- Keeps data accessible to authorized users wherever it resides – on endpoints, in the cloud, or after being shared externally
- Applies persistent encryption and dynamic access controls to prevent unauthorized use
- Ensures users can continue working securely, even when systems or networks experience partial outages
- Automatically backs up and syncs files in real time, ensuring users always access the latest version, even during disconnection or device failure
- Enables content virtualization, so documents are accessible and editable across teams without version conflict
- Maintains availability with integrity, preventing overwrites, duplication, or accidental loss
- Empowers remote and hybrid teams with seamless, secure access – anywhere, anytime
- Provides automated backup for files and allows selective recovery of critical documents
- Minimizes downtime after incidents such as accidental deletion, ransomware attacks, or endpoint failure
- Supports business continuity and data recovery policies across departments and geographies
Fasoo ensures that availability is not just about uptime – it’s about ensuring the right users can securely access the right data, at the right time, under any circumstance.
Resources
Product Overview
Solution
Fasoo Enterprise DRM
Meet with a Data
Security Specialist
Brochure
Learn more about
Fasoo Enterprise DRM
