A risk-and-resilience assessment is a structured review of the threats, vulnerabilities, and safeguards that affect a critical system. In cyber security, it looks at what could go wrong, how likely it is, and how well existing controls would limit the damage. For utilities and other essential services, this includes both IT and operational technology environments, because a weakness in remote access, identity management, or network design can affect physical operations.
This kind of assessment matters because critical infrastructure must keep working even under pressure. Defenders use it to identify weak credentials, missing asset inventories, flat networks, and other gaps that attackers often exploit to move from a small intrusion to a broader operational impact. It also supports planning for detection, containment, recovery, and continuity. In practice, the assessment is not just a paperwork exercise: it helps decide where to segment networks, harden access, and prioritize monitoring so resilience improves before an incident tests the system.