Building Digital Resilience in Social Care: Preparing for Cyber Incidents and System Failure
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Digital resilience in adult social care is not about preventing every cyber incident. It is about ensuring services can continue safely and effectively when systems fail, data is compromised or access to digital tools is disrupted. Commissioners increasingly expect providers to evidence not only cyber security controls, but realistic, operational resilience when technology goes wrong.
System outages, ransomware attacks and software failures can all interrupt care delivery, particularly where services rely on digital care records, electronic medication systems or automated rostering. Digital resilience therefore sits alongside IT and systems resilience and business continuity planning as a core assurance requirement.
What Digital Resilience Means in Practice
Digital resilience focuses on a provider’s ability to anticipate, absorb and recover from digital disruption without compromising safety or quality. This includes both malicious cyber incidents and non-malicious failures such as system outages, data corruption or supplier downtime.
In operational terms, this means providers must be prepared for scenarios where:
Digital care records are temporarily unavailable during visits or reviews.
Electronic medication systems cannot be accessed.
Rostering and scheduling platforms fail at short notice.
Communication systems with commissioners, hospitals or families are disrupted.
Each scenario presents direct risks to continuity of care, staff decision-making and safeguarding.
Planning for System Failure and Downtime
Effective digital resilience planning goes beyond high-level policies. Providers must develop practical, staff-ready procedures that can be implemented under pressure.
This typically includes maintaining controlled offline access to essential care information, such as printed summaries or secure local backups, with clear rules on confidentiality and version control.
Staff should know exactly how to record care delivery during outages, how to escalate issues, and how records will be reconciled once systems are restored. Without this clarity, gaps in records and missed care tasks quickly emerge.
Commissioner and Regulator Expectations
Commissioners increasingly test digital resilience through tender questions, contract monitoring and assurance visits. They are less interested in technical specifications and more focused on real-world readiness.
Providers are commonly expected to demonstrate that:
Digital resilience is embedded within business continuity plans and reviewed regularly.
Downtime procedures are tested through scenario planning or tabletop exercises.
Staff receive training on digital disruption procedures, not just system use.
There is a clear communication plan for informing commissioners and stakeholders during prolonged outages.
Governance, Oversight and Continuous Improvement
Digital resilience must be governed in the same way as other high-impact risks. Senior leaders should receive regular oversight reports covering system outages, near misses and recovery performance.
Following any significant disruption, providers should complete structured post-incident reviews. These reviews should identify what worked, where delays occurred and what changes are required to procedures, training or system design.
Commissioners and regulators increasingly expect to see evidence that learning has been embedded, rather than repeated assurances that systems are now “fixed”.
Linking Digital Resilience to Safeguarding and Quality
Ultimately, digital resilience protects people using services. Poor planning can result in missed visits, medication errors or incomplete records, increasing safeguarding risk.
By embedding digital resilience within quality assurance and safeguarding systems, providers can demonstrate that they understand the risks created by digital dependency and have taken proportionate, practical steps to manage them.
Strong digital resilience reassures commissioners that services can remain safe, responsive and reliable, even when technology fails.
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