Residual Risk

Definitions

1. The risk that remains after security controls, mitigations, or remediation steps have been applied. Residual risk is what decision-makers must consciously accept, transfer, or continue to reduce once perfect elimination of the issue is impractical.

   In plain English: The remaining risk left over after protections and fixes are in place.

   Example: "After segmentation and monitoring were added, the team documented the residual risk of keeping the unsupported device online for one more quarter."

Related Terms

• Account Lockout
• Baseline Security
• Bypass
• Legacy System Security
• Operational Risk
• Risk Acceptance
• Risk Control
• Risk Mitigation
• Risk Reduction