How do you calculate data loss exposure?

Multiply outage events per year by the dollar impact per event by the share of events still unprotected to get variable exposure, then add the fixed protection cost. With 6 events at $18,000, 40% unprotected, plus $22,000 fixed, total exposure is $65,200.

What counts as the dollar impact per outage event?

It bundles re-collection labor, lost batch genealogy, scrapped analytics, and any regulatory or quality-hold cost tied to missing process data. Here the average modeled impact works out to $10,866.67 per event across the year.

Should I include the protection cost in exposure?

Yes, for a true total-cost comparison. The point is to run the model twice — once at today's unprotected share and once at the lower share after protection — and confirm the variable exposure drops by more than the $22,000 fixed cost you're adding.

What is a good unprotected share to target?

Best-in-class OT shops drive the unprotected share toward single digits using store-and-forward buffering at the edge. Moving from 40% to 10% here would cut variable exposure from $43,200 to $10,800.

Exposure with protection vs without — how do I compare?

Run the calculator at your current unprotected share, then at the post-project share, keeping the fixed cost in only the protected run. If total exposure falls, the protection investment pays for itself.

Why is variable exposure separated from fixed cost?

Variable exposure ($43,200) scales with how exposed you are and is what protection reduces; the fixed cost ($22,000) is what you pay to reduce it. Separating them shows the lever you actually control.

IIoT, SCADA & Edge Connectivity calculator

Data Loss Exposure Calculator

Data Loss Exposure puts a dollar figure on the operational-technology data your plant could lose when historians, edge buffers or SCADA links go down. Plant managers, OT cybersecurity leads and reliability engineers use it to compare the cost of staying exposed against the fixed cost of protection like store-and-forward buffering or redundant historians. It matters because lost process data isn't just an IT inconvenience — it breaks batch genealogy, regulatory records and the analytics that drive yield. By separating variable exposure from fixed protection spend, the model lets you build a defensible business case for the buffering project.

What this calculator does

Estimate annual data loss exposure on the OT data path from outage events per year, dollar impact per event (lost analytics, regulator fine, missing batch record), the share of events not protected by store-and-forward or DR, and a fixed protection cost (replication, backup, redundant gateway).
Use it when an OT data ops or compliance lead is making the case for store-and-forward, DR, or redundant gateways before the next OT data outage hits a regulator-reported window.
It computes total annual data-loss exposure by combining the variable risk of unprotected outage events with the fixed annual cost of the protection program.

Formula used

Variable data loss exposure = outage events per year × impact per event × share unprotected
Total data loss exposure = variable exposure + fixed protection cost (compare exposure-without-protection vs. exposure-with-protection by changing share unprotected)

Inputs explained

OT data outage events per year:
Dollar impact per outage event:
Share of events not protected today:
Annual fixed protection cost:

How to use the result

Use it when building the business case for OT data protection (store-and-forward, redundant historians, edge buffering) or comparing the as-is exposure to a protected scenario.
Per-event impact is an average; a single catastrophic loss — a destroyed batch record or a regulatory finding — can dwarf the modeled average and isn't captured by a frequency-times-cost estimate.

Current U.S. benchmarks

Global copper trades at $13,484 per tonne (IMF via FRED, May 2026), up 41.5% in a year, and U.S. industrial electricity averages 8.66 cents per kWh. Both feed electrified-hardware unit economics.

Common questions

How do you calculate data loss exposure? Multiply outage events per year by the dollar impact per event by the share of events still unprotected to get variable exposure, then add the fixed protection cost. With 6 events at $18,000, 40% unprotected, plus $22,000 fixed, total exposure is $65,200.
What counts as the dollar impact per outage event? It bundles re-collection labor, lost batch genealogy, scrapped analytics, and any regulatory or quality-hold cost tied to missing process data. Here the average modeled impact works out to $10,866.67 per event across the year.
Should I include the protection cost in exposure? Yes, for a true total-cost comparison. The point is to run the model twice — once at today's unprotected share and once at the lower share after protection — and confirm the variable exposure drops by more than the $22,000 fixed cost you're adding.
What is a good unprotected share to target? Best-in-class OT shops drive the unprotected share toward single digits using store-and-forward buffering at the edge. Moving from 40% to 10% here would cut variable exposure from $43,200 to $10,800.
Exposure with protection vs without — how do I compare? Run the calculator at your current unprotected share, then at the post-project share, keeping the fixed cost in only the protected run. If total exposure falls, the protection investment pays for itself.

Last reviewed 2026-05-12.