Server and cyber resiliency with IBM Z

Maintain uninterrupted operations, safeguard sensitive data and defend against evolving cyberthreats

Get started guide
Illustration of a person sitting at a desk with IBM Z server and graphical charts elements

Minimize downtime

Resiliency is the foundation of trust and reliability in business operations. Downtime, data breaches or cyberattacks can disrupt services, erode customer confidence and lead to financial loss.

With IBM Z®, you gain the confidence to innovate securely, knowing your infrastructure is designed to withstand both internal failures and external threats. It helps mitigate system disruption risks by minimizing downtime, safeguarding sensitive data and helping ensure regulatory compliance across industries such as finance, healthcare and government.
High availability

Experience 99.999999% availability for uninterrupted operations.1
Double recovery speed

Restore service levels two times as fast than with prior systems.
Immutable backups

Recover promptly from ransomware and other cyber incidents.
Simplified compliance

Meet regulations by using encryption, data tagging and audit-ready capabilities.

Tools enabling resiliency

Built-in feature IBM Z® Cyber Vault

Protect critical data and recover quickly from cyberattacks with IBM Z Cyber Vault resiliency tool. It continuously monitors and validates data integrity on IBM Z systems, creating isolated, security-rich backups to detect and mitigate threats such as ransomware. By enabling rapid recovery and minimizing downtime, it helps ensure operational continuity and strengthens an organization’s overall cyber resilience.

 Get started with IBM Z Cyber Vault
Illustration of a person looking at charts and graphs
Built-in feature IBM® Flexible Capacity for Cyber Resiliency

Proactively avoid disruptions and test disaster recovery on demand, managing capacity across locations and transferring workloads on demand.

 Get started with Flexible Capacity for Cyber Resiliency Explore the documentation
Illustration of Z server with person on a computer looking at charts and graphs
IBM Z® System Recovery Boost

Double your recovery speed with System Recovery Boost, now with support for diagnostic data capture, middleware and GDPS policies.

 Explore System Recovery Boost Get started with System Recovery Boost
Software IBM Z® Backup Resiliency

Gain insight into data interdependence and vulnerabilities. Manage the recovery of core business applications by using analytics and automation, reducing dependency on domain experts.

 Explore IBM Z Backup Resiliency
Illustration of Z server with person on a computer looking at the world
Software IBM GDPS® for business continuity

Deliver extreme availability and recover automatically from outages with near-zero data loss within seconds.

Explore GDPS technologies Get started with IBM GDPS
Capability IBM Z® Pervasive Encryption

Secure data at rest and in transit with IBM Z Pervasive Encryption, maintaining cyber resiliency with minimal performance impact. It protects sensitive information from breaches, supports regulatory compliance and builds customer trust, enabling businesses to operate securely and efficiently.

 Explore pervasive encryption
Built-in feature IBM Z® Cyber Vault

Protect critical data and recover quickly from cyberattacks with IBM Z Cyber Vault resiliency tool. It continuously monitors and validates data integrity on IBM Z systems, creating isolated, security-rich backups to detect and mitigate threats such as ransomware. By enabling rapid recovery and minimizing downtime, it helps ensure operational continuity and strengthens an organization’s overall cyber resilience.

 Get started with IBM Z Cyber Vault
Illustration of a person looking at charts and graphs
Built-in feature IBM® Flexible Capacity for Cyber Resiliency

Proactively avoid disruptions and test disaster recovery on demand, managing capacity across locations and transferring workloads on demand.

 Get started with Flexible Capacity for Cyber Resiliency Explore the documentation
Illustration of Z server with person on a computer looking at charts and graphs
IBM Z® System Recovery Boost

Double your recovery speed with System Recovery Boost, now with support for diagnostic data capture, middleware and GDPS policies.

 Explore System Recovery Boost Get started with System Recovery Boost
Software IBM Z® Backup Resiliency

Gain insight into data interdependence and vulnerabilities. Manage the recovery of core business applications by using analytics and automation, reducing dependency on domain experts.

 Explore IBM Z Backup Resiliency
Illustration of Z server with person on a computer looking at the world
Software IBM GDPS® for business continuity

Deliver extreme availability and recover automatically from outages with near-zero data loss within seconds.

Explore GDPS technologies Get started with IBM GDPS
Capability IBM Z® Pervasive Encryption

Secure data at rest and in transit with IBM Z Pervasive Encryption, maintaining cyber resiliency with minimal performance impact. It protects sensitive information from breaches, supports regulatory compliance and builds customer trust, enabling businesses to operate securely and efficiently.

 Explore pervasive encryption

Use cases

Bank icon
Financial services

Maintain 24x7 banking operations with robust fault tolerance and security-rich transaction processing.
Patient information sheet icon
Healthcare

Protect patient data with enterprise-grade encryption while maintaining uninterrupted access to critical applications.
Transaction and virtual purchase icon
Retail and e-commerce

Handle peak loads during holiday sales or special promotions without system degradation or outages.
Security badge icon
Government and public sector

Secure sensitive citizen data and help ensure rapid recovery in the face of cyberattacks or natural disasters.

Case study

Achieve always-on mobile banking services

Bradesco, a leading Brazilian bank, uses IBM z Systems to handle 1.5 billion monthly transactions with unmatched resiliency, security and agility. This platform helps ensure continuous operations, scalability and robust protection for sensitive data, enabling the bank to meet customer demands seamlessly while supporting business growth.

Storage backup for resiliency

IBM Storage DS8000
IBM DS8000 for data resiliency The IBM DS8000® series provides high-performance, enterprise-grade storage systems designed for critical workloads. Use seamless integration with IBM Z and Cyber Vault to create immutable backups that are recoverable after a cyber incident or disaster. Explore DS8000 storage Explore DS8000 storage
Take the next step

Explore technical resources and use cases for resilient servers for IBM Z to learn how to recover systems without data loss, and defeat ransomware.

 Explore technical resources Discover IBM z17®
Security software for IBM Z

Mainframe security and resiliency software solutions for end-to-end protection.

 Explore security software Advanced security on IBM Z

Enable industry-leading built-in advance security features on your IBM mainframe system.

 Explore advance security features Quantum-safe security for IBM Z

Protect sensitive data against future threats posed by quantum computing.

 Explore quantum-safe security
Footnotes

1 IBM z17 systems, with GDPS, IBM DS8000 series storage with HyperSwap, and running a Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform environment, are designed to deliver 99.999999% availability.

DISCLAIMER: IBM internal data based on measurements and projections was used in calculating the expected value. Necessary components include IBM z17; IBM z/VM V7.3 systems or above collected in a Single System Image, each running RHOCP 4.14 or above; IBM Operations Manager; GDPS 4.6 or above for management of data recovery and virtual machine recovery across metro distance systems and storage, including Metro Multi-site workload and GDPS Global; and IBM DS8000 series storage with IBM HyperSwap. A MongoDB v4.4 workload was used. Necessary resiliency technology must be enabled, including z/VM Single System Image clustering, GDPS xDR Proxy for z/VM, and Red Hat OpenShift Data Foundation (ODF) 4.14 or above for management of local storage devices. Application-induced outages are not included in the above measurements. Other configurations (hardware or software) may provide different availability characteristics.

For clients running z/OS v3.1 or higher with a configured high availability IBM software stack on IBM z16 or IBM z17, users can expect up to 99.999999% availability or 315.58 milliseconds of downtime per year when using a GDPS 4.7 Continuous Availability (CA) configuration and workloads.

DISCLAIMER: The claim is based on IBM internal data and a GDPS CA three-site configuration, 2 active Sysplex sites and 1 Disaster Recovery (DR) site, consisting of z/OS 3.1 or higher with a Recovery Time objective (RTO) of 2 minutes or less, one of the required GDPS CA IBM middleware stack workloads and replication products running on IBM z16 or IBM z17. GDPS CA includes resiliency features such as Parallel Sysplex enabled data sharing applications, GDPS Metro Mirror replication (Hyperswap), software replication, and other CA configuration documented high availability features. A supported GDPS CA middleware stack could include CICS v6.2, IMS v15.5, MQ v9.4, and Db2 v13 or at later releases. Clients must follow maintenance, configuration, capacity planning and testing best practices for the entire software stack and hardware configuration. This includes enabling all the resiliency technology for their workloads as defined by GDPS CA, z/OS, and workload related software products. Other configurations may have different availability characteristics.