Cisco 350-501 Exam Prep
Implementing and Operating Cisco Service Provider Network Core Technologies (SPCOR) (Page 7 )

• A. IDS attack signatures: Primarily detects suspicious network activity, not necessarily malware embedded in uploaded files.
• C. Load balancer: Improves availability and distributes traffic; it does not inspect documents for malware.
• D. WAF: Protects web applications from attacks such as SQL injection and command injection, but its primary role is not scanning uploaded PDFs for malware.

1. Get Data ? Folder in Power BI Desktop.
2. In Power Query Editor, expand the Attributes column to expose metadata such as hidden status and other file attributes.
3. Remove the Content column (and any other data columns you do not need).

• Name
• Extension
• Date accessed
• Date modified
• Folder Path
• Attributes
• Content

• Approve major information security policies
• Allocate funding and resources
• Set the organization’s risk appetite
• Ensure security supports business objectives

• Evaluating vendors is generally handled by security, procurement, or technical teams.
• Assessing risks is typically performed by security and risk-management professionals, with management accepting or prioritizing the risks.
• Monitoring regulatory adherence is usually handled by compliance, audit, or security functions.

• Wiping securely overwrites the drive so the original data cannot reasonably be recovered. It is generally less expensive than physically destroying the device.
• Recycling could expose the data if the drive is not securely erased first.
• Shredding physically destroys the drive and is effective, but usually more costly and prevents reuse.
• Deletion only removes file references; it is not a secure sanitization method.

• SQL injection (SQLi): Attacks databases by inserting malicious SQL commands.
• Cross-site scripting (XSS): Injects scripts into web pages viewed by other users.
• Sideloading: Installing an application from outside the official app store. It may install unauthorized apps, but it does not generally unlock the operating system or enable restricted system features.

• The identified risk
• Its likelihood and potential impact
• The person or team responsible for handling it
• The response or treatment plan
• Risk thresholds, such as when escalation or action is required
• Current status and review dates

• Risk tolerance: The amount of risk an organization is willing to accept; it is a concept or limit, not usually the primary documentation.
• Risk transfer: Moving the responsibility or financial impact of a risk to another party, such as through insurance.
• Risk analysis: The process of evaluating risk likelihood and impact.

• How quickly the vendor must respond to an incident or request
• Target resolution times
• Availability or uptime requirements
• Performance metrics and penalties for not meeting them

• SOW (Statement of Work): Describes the project’s scope, tasks, deliverables, and timeline.
• MOA (Memorandum of Agreement): Documents a formal agreement to cooperate or perform specific activities.
• MOU (Memorandum of Understanding): Records a mutual understanding or intent, often less binding than a contract.

• Help the team identify the causes of delays.
• Encourage continuous improvement through retrospectives.
• Support the team in changing its process, tools, or collaboration methods.
• Help remove impediments that the team cannot resolve independently.

• A: An impediment log may help, but simply maintaining it does not ensure the impediments are resolved.
• B: Directing the team to solutions conflicts with agile self-management.
• C: Adding impediments to the product backlog could delay their resolution and treats them like product features.

1. Which host originated the infection

1. Which remaining hosts are infected

• The servers are powered on.
• The network is functioning.
• Devices can still reach the server network.

• ARP poisoning: Redirects or intercepts local network traffic; it usually affects communication paths rather than overwhelming a service.
• Jamming: Disrupts wireless or radio signals. It would not fit a system that remains accessible from devices on the server network.
• Kerberoasting: Attempts to crack service-account credentials from Kerberos tickets; it does not normally cause an immediate outage.

• Separate accounts/domains create a strong administrative boundary between non-production and production.
• Separate projects provide distinct IAM boundaries, billing, quotas, service accounts, and resources.
• Developers can receive permissions in the development project without automatically gaining access to production.
• Production administrators can be restricted from development resources, supporting separation of duties and least privilege.

• A: Creates excessive project fragmentation without being required by the stated requirement.
• C: Keeps development and production under one account and does not clearly separate administrative duties.
• D: Uses one account and only two projects; it provides some project isolation but weaker organizational separation.

• Hardware and infrastructure
• System software
• Networks and communications
• Technology platforms and services

• Business Architecture: Defines business strategy, organization, functions, and processes.
• Data Architecture: Defines the structure and management of enterprise data.
• Application Architecture: Describes application systems and how they interact to support business and data processing.

• Leaf switches provide access ports for servers, endpoints, and other devices.
• Spine switches form the fabric’s backbone.
• Every leaf connects to every spine, creating a predictable, high-bandwidth, low-latency path.

• A: Adding both a spine and leaf is unnecessary for simply adding access ports.
• B: Adding a spine does not directly provide endpoint access ports.
• D: A single connection to one spine creates a bottleneck and a single point of failure.

1. Determine which host was infected first—the originating host.
2. Decide whether each other host is clean or infected based on communication and event logs.

• Compare timestamps and find the earliest suspicious event.
• Look for the host that initiated the malicious connection, file transfer, exploit, or command—not merely a host that later received traffic.
• Follow the timeline through the firewall:

• A host is likely infected if it both receives suspicious activity and then initiates related malicious traffic.
• A host may be clean if the firewall blocked the connection and there is no evidence of execution or follow-on communication.

• Subject: The entity that initiates an action—here, Derrick/user account.
• Object: The resource being accessed— the file.
• Action: Reading the file.

• A Layer 2 switch checks the destination MAC address in its MAC address table (CAM table).
• If the destination MAC is unknown, the switch cannot select a specific outgoing port.
• It therefore performs unknown-unicast flooding, sending the frame out every other port in that VLAN.
• The frame is not sent back through the port where it arrived.

Question 3: AWS Storage Gateway File Gateway

• A: S3 bucket per user — S3 is object storage, not a traditional shared file system; mounting it requires extra tools and is less efficient.
• B: File Gateway — Provides a local file share using standard file protocols while storing files in Amazon S3. This preserves convenient local access and extends storage capacity.
• C: WorkSpaces and WorkDocs — Designed for virtual desktops and document collaboration, not large shared file storage.
• D: EC2 with EBS — EBS is attached to one EC2 instance and is not designed for direct multi-user file sharing.

• Store privileged credentials securely
• Grant the consultant only the access needed
• Provide temporary or time-limited access
• Rotate passwords automatically
• Record or monitor administrator sessions

• TACACS+: Centralizes authentication and authorization, commonly for network devices, but does not primarily provide password vaulting and privileged-session control.
• SAML: Enables web-based federation and single sign-on, not privileged credential management.
• SSO platform: Reduces the number of passwords users need, but does not necessarily protect administrative credentials or control privileged sessions.
• Role-based access control (RBAC): Assigns permissions based on job roles, but does not by itself prevent password sharing or securely broker administrator access.

• Amazon S3 — Object storage, not a database.
• Amazon DynamoDB — Fully managed NoSQL key-value and document database.
• Amazon Redshift — Managed data warehouse designed for analytics, not primarily transactional MySQL workloads.

• Fileless malware: Nothing in the command indicates malware executing only in memory.
• Living-off-the-land binaries: Mimikatz is a credential-access tool, not a normal system utility used for LOLBin abuse.
• Social engineering: The command shows technical credential abuse, not manipulation of an accountant.

• Continuous deployment: Automates software releases; it does not specifically test input handling.
• Static code analysis: Examines source or compiled code without executing it. It can find coding flaws but does not directly stress the application with malformed inputs.
• Manual peer review: Developers inspect code or design manually. Useful, but not the best practice specifically for testing how a live product handles invalid input.

• Online payment fraud
• Account takeover
• Fake account creation
• Suspicious transactions

• vSmart controls the overlay control plane. It uses OMP to exchange routing information, distribute policies, and determine how WAN Edge devices reach one another.
• vManage is the centralized management and configuration platform.
• vBond is the orchestrator. It helps devices authenticate, discover controllers, and traverse NAT during onboarding.
• APIC-EM is not the SD-WAN control-plane component described here.

• Tactics: The attacker’s overall goal, such as gaining persistence or exfiltrating data
• Techniques: The methods used to achieve that goal
• Procedures: The specific implementation or sequence of actions

• IP addresses and hash values: Useful indicators, but they can change quickly.
• Indicators of compromise: TTPs may help identify IOCs, but their main value is describing behavior.
• Tools: Attackers can replace tools or use legitimate administrative utilities.

sql 
CREATE TABLE my_table 
USING CSV 
OPTIONS (path '/path/to/csv');

sql 
CREATE TABLE my_table 
USING CSV 
LOCATION '/path/to/csv';

• USING CSV specifies the file format.
• path or LOCATION specifies where the files are stored.
• USING DELTA would be used only when the source data is in Delta format.
• FROM is used in a SELECT statement, not normally as the format declaration in CREATE TABLE.

• An Azure pay-as-you-go subscription follows an operational expenditure (OpEx) model.
• With OpEx, the organization pays for services as they are used, typically based on consumption.
• There is no need to purchase and maintain physical servers upfront.
• This contrasts with capital expenditure (CapEx), where the company makes a significant upfront investment in infrastructure, such as on-premises Hyper-V hosts.

• D — Create sibling resource pools for the Production VMs and Test VMs.

• B — Configure a memory reservation on the Production resource pool.

• Shares only determine relative priority when resources are scarce; they do not guarantee memory.
• A parent resource pool alone does not provide a guarantee.
• A child pool for Test VMs does not reserve memory for Production.

• Import: Copies data into the Power BI model. It requires scheduled or manual refresh, so it may not meet the two-minute requirement.
• Live connection: Connects to an existing Power BI semantic model or Analysis Services model; it is not the appropriate choice for connecting directly to the Azure SQL database in this scenario.

• AWS Audit Manager continuously collects evidence from AWS services and helps assess whether workloads comply with regulatory frameworks and internal policies. It can produce audit-ready reports.
• AWS Config records resource configurations and evaluates them against compliance rules. For example, it can check whether encryption, logging, or access settings meet company requirements.

• Amazon Inspector identifies software vulnerabilities and unintended network exposure, not general policy or regulatory compliance.
• Amazon CloudWatch monitors metrics, logs, and operational events, but is not primarily a compliance assessment service.
• AWS CloudTrail records API activity for auditing and investigation. It supports compliance, but does not itself provide the structured compliance assessment capabilities of Audit Manager and Config.

• B. Data loss prevention (DLP): Helps prevent sensitive data from being copied, emailed, or exfiltrated. It is not the primary control for protecting a stolen laptop’s stored data.
• C. Operating system hardening: Reduces vulnerabilities by disabling unnecessary services and applying secure settings, but it does not necessarily protect the files if the disk is accessed directly.
• D. Boot security: Helps ensure the device starts only through trusted software or approved processes. It supports platform integrity but does not itself encrypt stored files.

• Writing with Apache Spark, typically as Delta tables.
• Reading with Apache Spark for processing and analysis.
• Reading with T-SQL through the lakehouse’s automatically generated SQL analytics endpoint.
• Reading with KQL through Fabric’s query capabilities that can access lakehouse data.

• Eventhouse: Optimized for real-time and KQL workloads, but it is not the natural destination for Spark-based writes or general lakehouse storage.
• Datamart: Intended mainly for relational analytics and Power BI; it is not designed for Spark-based data ingestion.
• Warehouse: Primarily T-SQL-based and structured. It does not provide the same native Spark write experience or flexibility for semi-structured data.

• The connecting host keeps the private key securely.
• The destination host stores the corresponding public key in its authorized keys.
• Authentication can occur without a person entering credentials each time.
• SSH also provides encrypted communication and host authentication.

• Biometric: Requires a human user and is difficult to automate.
• Smart card: Often requires user interaction or card access.
• Hard-coded password: Unsafe because passwords stored in scripts or applications can be exposed, reused, or difficult to manage securely.

• SAML: Enables federated authentication and single sign-on between the IdP and SaaS providers.
• OAuth tokens: Allow delegated application access; OAuth is not primarily the first step for employee SSO.
• Password vaulting: Stores or autofills multiple passwords but does not eliminate the separate credentials or provide true federation.

• Uses on-premises data or resources
• Runs components in the cloud
• Can scale across multiple cloud environments when demand increases

• Public cloud: Resources are hosted entirely by a cloud provider.
• Private cloud: Resources are dedicated to one organization, usually in its own environment.
• Hybrid: Combines on-premises and cloud resources.

• A vulnerability scanner automates discovery of known vulnerabilities and misconfigurations across systems. It can contribute to a supply-chain assessment.
• A penetration test actively attempts exploitation and is usually limited to an agreed scope.
• SCAP standardizes vulnerability and configuration assessment data; it is not the analysis itself.
• Illumination tool is not a commonly defined CompTIA Security+ term.

• A limited lifetime
• Permissions defined by an IAM role or policy
• The ability to access AWS APIs without using long-term IAM user credentials

• Amazon API Gateway — Builds and manages APIs; it does not generally issue AWS credentials for applications.
• IAM users — Usually use long-term credentials, which are less suitable for applications.
• IAM instance profiles — Provide temporary role credentials to applications running on EC2 instances, but are specifically tied to EC2. The broader requirement described is best met by AWS STS.