A Proposal for an Ontology to Enhance IT Architecture Resilience

With the proliferation of digital infrastructure, their complexity and vulnerability to cyber threats are major concerns when it comes to ensuring the resilience of IT architectures. This is particularly true when traditional cybersecurity models are based on protection and defence, neglecting the ability to continue operating despite the occurrence of disruptions. This paper proposes a formal ontology and an operational framework for analyzing and strengthening the resilience of IT architectures. The proposed ontology classifies resilience into three fundamental dimensions, namely robustness, adaptability and recovery, and enables the systematic identification of architecture weaknesses and the implementation of targeted improvements so as to transform a non-resilient architecture $\mathcal{A}$ into a more resilient architecture ${\mathcal{A}}^{\prime}$. This structured approach is available to IT professionals, system architects and security analysts to improve system robustness, automate fault response and ensure business continuity in the face of the cyber threat and the reality of operational disruption.