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With growing unrest in the US, there is growing concern that there will be unrest in the country following the Presidential election in November of 2020. While the country continues to deal with ongoing race riots and protests all over the country, it is important to remember that these may be localized to a particular city or even neighborhoods in which the protests are taking place. While it is important to listen to those that are protesting and what their concerns might be. It can’t be disputed that these actions continue to alienate a large part of the population. No matter where you are on the political spectrum, these civil disturbances can directly affect your business. This is not strictly effecting large or national businesses, as we have seen local independent companies effected just as much as the large chain stores. Protests vs. Large Scale Unrest When the terms protest and large scale unrest are used, they can be a little confusing. Protests may be short lived and for one political cause and may last a few hours to maybe even days. A large scales civil unrest is different in that it may encompass a large part of the country as a whole and large numbers of the population take to the streets to demand their demands to be heard. Additionally, large governmental infrastructure (power grid, Internet, supply lines, roadways) may also be impacted as protesters sabotage or disable them in order to make more of the population aware of what is going on. Also, killings of individuals may occur on a regular basis as the population on each side of the political divide fight for their cause. Business Continuity Planning As with any event that may have the possibility of impacting your business, it will be important to plan for the worst case scenario when it comes to a civil unrest situation. With a lot of things in 2020, the unexpected event is one thing you can expect this year. Within the IT Security community, we are treading on new ground as we have never been through a pandemic, and yet we find ourselves 7 months into one. We don’t know what to expect with a large scale civil unrest. Plan for Major Interruptions The one thing Business Continuity has shown us is that we can plan for those events that are most likely to happen instead of those events that may never happen. With civil unrest, the following should be the top of your list of impacting events to prepare for:
While there is not one area on the list that may directly impact your business, any combination of them surely will. Also, while other countries around the world have had to cope with similar issues or impacting events. It is important to realize that the US has not and that North America houses the largest majority of the global Internet infrastructure. So what happens on the continent could have global ramifications.
Pandemic with Civil Unrest The majority of businesses today are worried about just dealing with the global pandemic going on. But if the civil unrest were to materialize, then there will be a lot more to worry about. Just this one event could have the potential of derailing any sort of recovery effort that might be in the works at this time. Businesses should take the “lessons learned” from dealing with the pandemic and use them to potentially deal with a civil unrest scenario as most of the responses could be similar to those. Companies will find ways in which to deal with outages or interruptions, but when the violence comes to the individual neighborhoods or communities, then they may be effected in very different ways. Brining the Fight As with all disturbances, civil unrest can cause the business to be impacted in different ways compared to other potential scenarios. Choosing to fight against the opposing party may be part of that as personnel may be killed or injured. This can also cause issues if there are mass arrests that may happen as part of the rioting or protests that happen for longer than normal period of time. A company may also come under fire for supporting on faction over the other or may be forced to support one group over the other by mass crowds, or even in the media. (This is currently happening with groups like BLM, as they support Marxist and Communist ideologies, and the destruction of the nuclear family). Employees will be new the equation as most of the business continuity planning take only the company infrastructure or business operations into consideration in their recovery efforts. The loss of personnel will cause businesses to have to replace personnel or work differently than they did previously prior to the outbreak of the disturbances. Systems are easy to replace, personnel are not. Summary While this article may seem to be raising unreasonable concerns or un-needed worry. Just think a few months ago about the potential for a global pandemic, and yet here we are. Plan for the worst potential in hopes that they never materialize. I would not be doing my job if I would look the other way and not look at the potential that this time in our country could possibly impact the businesses we work for and with. Planning for a disaster is the same whether it is a man-made on or natural. It is still not too late to take action and address the various concerns that have been brought up here. Planning on how you would react if given a specific scenario helps to sharpen our skills in responding to disasters and also helps us be more confident in our recovery efforts if they may be needed. Disclaimer This article is meant to be a thought exercise on how businesses would recover in case of a large scale political unrest were to hit the US. This article in no way endorses or condones violence of any type (from any side). It is the hope of this author that all registered voters exercise their Constitutional right and vote in the upcoming election and that there may still be a middle ground in which both political sides can get together and discuss the issues affecting our country.
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