The term “resilience” comes from physics: It’s the ability of a substance to return to its usual shape after being bent, stretched, or pressed. Tennis balls are often cited as examples of resilience: Toss a ball and it will bounce back without its shape being changed. This stands in stark contrast to tomatoes: Throw a tomato and you'll probably need to jump away avoiding splashes on your clothes.
The resilience term has been adopted by the IT community, particularly as it relates to security. Cyber resilience is the ability to keep IT systems up and running while under attack. Indeed, one definition states: “Cyber resilience refers to an entity's ability to continuously deliver the intended outcome, despite adverse cyber events.” The goal is to avoid business downtime and all associated costs, including the loss of revenue, productivity and customer loyalty.