Flexibility vs. Structure: How to Manage Reliably Continuously Emerging Threats in Malware Protection

High Reliability Organizations (HROs) operate in risky and safety-critical environments where failure avoidance overrides cost efficiency and other traditional performance measures. Research on military, air traffic control, and similar domains has identified five key HRO characteristics: preoccupation with failure, reluctance to simplify interpretations, sensitivity to operations, commitment to resilience, and under specification of structures. There are fewer studies on digital technologies' role in HRO operations. We address this gap with a case study in a leading malware (e.g., Anti-virus) protection firm, which must establish high reliability in its digital operations. While the daily influx of millions of samples and the continuous mutation of malware attacks requires large-scale automation in malware protection, it also calls for continuous fine-tuning and re-engineering through human intervention. We examine the constant balancing of automated and human effort driven by the preoccupation with potential hidden vulnerabilities. This provides a starting point for conceptualizing "digital HROs" as a new research domain for organizational research.