ISC2 ISSMP Exam Prep
Information Systems Security Management Professional (Page 6 )

• The correct answer is A: CCTV recordings are not regularly reviewed.

• CCTV is a monitoring/control mechanism. If recordings aren’t reviewed, security events (break-ins, policy violations, equipment tampering) can go undetected and unaddressed.
• Regular review is essential for deterrence, incident response, and forensic evidence. Without it, the entire CCTV control provides little value.

• B (records deleted after one year) affects forensic availability, but it’s a data-retention issue rather than the ongoing effectiveness of the surveillance program.
• C (footage not recorded 24x7) creates gaps in coverage, which is a concern, but regular review of available footage still supports detection; 24x7 coverage is a separate policy/perimeter issue.
• D (cameras not in break rooms) is more about privacy and space planning than core data-center security monitoring.

• Answer: D) Shadow IT

• Why: Shadow IT is when employees use unsanctioned tools or bypass IT controls (like the VPN) to access services, often without IT oversight. It’s an internal behavior, not an external attacker’s activity.

• Not these:

• Quick note: This creates risk due to lack of visibility and control. Mitigations include a defined approved-tools list, enforcing VPN usage, device management, and continuous monitoring.

• Answer: A. Use Amazon SageMaker Serverless Inference to deploy the model.

• Why: SageMaker Serverless Inference hosts the model and serves real-time predictions without you provisioning or managing servers. It scales automatically and handles deployment details.

• Why the others aren’t suitable:

• Quick example flow: web app ? SageMaker Serverless Inference endpoint ? model ? response.

• A separate scope using a /32 subnet: A /32 identifies one host, but it is not a practical DHCP scope for this purpose.
• A static IP within the DHCP range: This can cause an IP address conflict if DHCP assigns that address to another device.
• SLAAC: Used for automatic IPv6 address configuration, not for assigning a predictable IPv4 address through DHCP.

• prompt: the input or instruction given to the model
• completion: the desired response

json 
{"prompt":"Summarize this customer complaint.","completion":"The customer reports a delayed shipment."}

• B: A .txt file containing CSV-style lines is not automatically a valid fine-tuning dataset. The required structure and format must match the selected Bedrock model.
• C: Provisioned Throughput provides dedicated inference capacity; it does not fine-tune a model.
• D: Journals and textbooks might support domain adaptation or pretraining, but they do not provide the prompt-to-answer examples typically required for supervised fine-tuning.

• The correct answer: B) Synthetic identity theft.

• Synthetic identity theft involves creating a new, forged identity by combining information from multiple real people (e.g., names, dates of birth, SSNs) to commit fraud.
• In the scenario, Adam “created a new identity by obtaining information from different victims,” which matches the idea of synthesizing data to form a fake person.

• Medical identity theft: using someone’s medical information to obtain care or services.
• Tax identity theft: using someone’s personal info to file fraudulent tax returns.
• Social identity theft: impersonating someone to deceive others socially or publicly.

• Look for phrases like “create a new identity” or “combine information from multiple people” to identify synthetic identity theft.

• Answer: No.

• Why: Microsoft Managed Desktop (MD) is a managed service for end-user desktops (Windows devices used by people), not a service for provisioning, managing, or lifecycle-managing large fleets of virtual machines. It won’t help automate weekly creation and deletion of many VMs, especially with mixed OS (Windows and Linux).

• Relevant concept: To reduce administrative effort for rapidly provisioning and tearing down VMs, an Azure service like Azure DevTest Labs is appropriate. DevTest Labs lets you:

• Takeaway: The proposed solution (MD) does not meet the goal; the correct approach is to use a lab-oriented service such as Azure DevTest Labs for frequent, ephemeral VM deployments.

• Goal: Guests should not use cameras, but company users can.
• Correct configuration: Guest access settings in the Org-wide settings.

• External access: Controls external-domain communication, not guest capabilities inside Teams.
• Teams settings in Org-wide settings: Too generic; doesn’t specifically target guest capabilities.
• Audio & Video in the default Meeting Policy: Would affect everyone assigned to that policy. To meet the requirement without impacting internal users, you’d need separate policies or guest-specific settings; the exam focuses on the guest-access policy.

• Interactive development and exploration
• Small datasets
• Lightweight transformations or testing
• Avoiding the overhead and cost of multiple workers

• Automated reports: Jobs may benefit from job clusters or SQL warehouses.
• Working with SQL in Databricks SQL: Databricks SQL warehouses are the relevant compute option.
• Automatically scaling for larger data: A multi-node cluster with autoscaling is more suitable.
• Large amounts of data: Distributed worker nodes are generally needed.

• Control plane: Managed by Databricks and contains the Databricks web application, workspace services, cluster management, and job orchestration.
• Data plane: Runs in your cloud account and contains compute resources such as:

• Worker node: Data plane compute.
• Driver node: Data plane compute.
• JDBC data source: Usually an external data system.
• Databricks Filesystem (DBFS): Provides storage access and is backed by cloud object storage rather than being entirely part of the control plane.

• On-Demand: You pay by the hour with no long-term commitment. This is ideal for workloads that are infrequent or have highly variable usage. Since this job runs only 24 hours once per year, you pay only for those 24 hours, with no wasted upfront or long-term payments.
• Reserved Instances: Require a 1- or 3-year commitment and pay for capacity whether you use it or not. For a workload that runs just 24 hours a year, you’d be paying for most of the term unused, making it far less cost-efficient.
• Spot Instances: Can be interrupted whenever AWS needs capacity, which is unacceptable for an uninterruptible workload.
• Dedicated Instances: Generally more expensive and aimed at licensing or compliance requirements; not needed for this use case.

• MFA verifies a user’s identity using additional authentication factors, such as a phone prompt or security token.
• It helps prevent unauthorized access even if a password is compromised.
• It does not provide secure storage or encryption of credentials used during automated deployment.

• Answer: D

• The strongest security comes from enforcing access at the storage layer. An IAM policy scoped to the Cognito identity prefix restricts each user to their own S3 prefix (folder), so users can only access their own files regardless of client or server code.
• This per-user isolation reduces risk of cross-user data access and is more robust than UI validation or Lambda/API validation alone.
• Implementation note: attach a policy to the Cognito identity role that allows actions on arn:aws:s3:::your-bucket/${cognito-identity.amazonaws.com:sub}/* (per-user prefix). Ensure TLS in transit and enable at-rest encryption (SSE-S3 or SSE-KMS). Use multipart upload for large files up to 300 MB.

• A recipient who already has a Microsoft account or an organizational account can authenticate by signing in.
• A recipient without a usable Microsoft identity may receive a one-time passcode by email.
• The passcode is sent to the same email address that was invited and is used to verify ownership of that address.

• Windows 10 VMs
• Windows Server 2012 or later VMs
• Running VMs—they do not need to be shut down
• Debian 8.2+ VMs, assuming the specific version is supported
• Stopped or deallocated VMs

• Create a record-triggered Flow on Opportunity.
• Run it when the record is created or updated.
• Add entry criteria such as Probability > 50%.
• Use Create Records to create the related Sales Demo Request, populating its Opportunity lookup.

• Apex Trigger: Possible, but unnecessary custom code for a straightforward automation requirement.
• Workflow Rule: Cannot create a related custom record.
• Process Builder: Could create a record, but Flow is Salesforce’s preferred and more capable declarative automation tool.

• Pay-as-you-go in Azure is an operating expense (OPEX) model, not an “elastic” expenditure model.
• Elastic or scalable terms describe capacity planning, not the cost category. The cost should be treated as OPEX since you pay for usage each month.
• The parallel question (Question 12) shows the correct approach is using an operational expenditure model.

• Correct answer: B) Context window.

• Why: The context window is the number of tokens the foundation model can process in a single inference. It sets the maximum length of the combined input (prompt) and the model’s output. A larger context window allows more content to be included in one prompt.

• How to use: Check the FM’s context window value and ensure your prompt length plus the desired completion stays within that limit. If needed, summarize or split input across multiple prompts.

• Why the other options aren’t correct:

• Quick tip: Verify the specific FM’s context window for Bedrock, since different models have different token limits.

• Review iteration length: Changing duration does not resolve unclear requirements.
• Limit work in progress: Useful when excessive multitasking is the problem, but it does not directly clarify requirements.
• Review individual performance: The issue is a process and backlog-quality problem, not necessarily an individual performance problem.

• Mesh: WAPs communicate wirelessly with one another, often to extend coverage without wired connections. It does not specifically describe centralized WLC management.
• Point-to-point: Connects two specific devices or locations.
• Ad hoc: Wireless devices communicate directly with one another without an access point.

• RPO (Recovery Point Objective) — maximum acceptable data loss, measured in time. It specifies how far back in time you can tolerate data loss. Example: RPO of 2 hours means backups must occur at least every 2 hours.

• ARO (Annualized Rate of Occurrence) — expected frequency of a threat occurring per year. It estimates how often a risk is likely to happen on average (used in risk calculations).

• MTTR (Mean Time To Recover) — average time to recover/restore service after an incident. It includes detection, repair, and restoration time, and helps gauge downtime and alignment with RTO.

• Strongest encryption algorithms: Choose the strongest available encryption and integrity options, typically AES with the largest key size and a secure integrity algorithm.
• Encrypt all traffic: Select tunnel mode rather than transport mode. Tunnel mode encrypts the entire original IP packet, which is appropriate for a site-to-site VPN between branch networks.
• Secret-password authentication: Configure a pre-shared key (PSK) on both VPN concentrators. The key must match at both ends.

• The inference container image or built-in algorithm
• The location of model artifacts in Amazon S3
• IAM permissions through the execution role
• Optional environment variables and networking settings

1. Create AWS::SageMaker::Model
2. Create an AWS::SageMaker::EndpointConfig that references the model
3. Create AWS::SageMaker::Endpoint that references the endpoint configuration

• AWS::SageMaker::Endpoint hosts a model but does not define the model itself.
• AWS::SageMaker::NotebookInstance provides a development environment.
• AWS::SageMaker::Pipeline orchestrates ML workflow steps.

• Used for communication on the local link or LAN segment
• Automatically generated on IPv6-enabled interfaces
• Not routed by routers to other networks
• Commonly used by devices to communicate with their local IPv6 router
• Begins with FE80 through FEBF

• FC00::/7 — unique local unicast
• FE80::/10 — link-local unicast
• FF00::/8 — multicast
• 2000::/3 — global unicast

• Post-Incident Review (A) is the after-action step used to capture lessons learned, identify process gaps, and drive improvements across the incident response lifecycle. This directly supports process maturity and a stronger security posture.
• Incident Analysis (D) focuses on investigating root causes during/after an incident, which is important but more of a diagnostic activity than a standalone baseline improvement to maturity.
• Fast Eradication (B) and Incident Containment (C) are tactical actions aimed at stopping the incident, not on maturing the process.

• Answer: A

• Reason: The Standard web tier is the lowest tier that provides dedicated compute, built-in load balancing across instances, and sufficient storage to host multiple apps with custom domains. Basic may lack the required scalability/storage, while Free/Shared do not offer dedicated compute or proper load balancing.

• 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.

• B — Prompts and suggestions retained for 28 days
• C — User engagement data kept for two years

• The key distinction is between content data—your prompts, code context, and generated suggestions—and engagement data, such as usage activity.
• Do not confuse retention with training: enterprise Copilot data is generally not used to train GitHub’s models without appropriate authorization.
• For a current exam, verify the policy version cited by the exam provider. The key’s C is likely correct, but B should be treated cautiously and may no longer reflect the current policy.

• An IDS monitors network traffic for signs of attacks and raises alerts. It can be deployed out-of-band (via a SPAN/mirror port or a tap) so it analyzes traffic without being inline, meaning it doesn’t measurably affect latency.
• An IPS (intrusion prevention system) is inline and can block threats, but that processing can introduce some latency and potential throughput impact.
• A firewall also inspects traffic and can add latency, though usually modest with proper hardware, but its primary purpose isn’t continuous passive analysis.
• A load balancer distributes traffic and isn’t used for intrusion analysis.

• Use a field on Account to show the aggregated yearly shipments (a Roll-Up Summary).
• A Master-Detail relationship between Shipment and Account is required for Roll-Up Summary to work (and to ensure access is governed by the parent Account).
• OWD and the relationship type determine what users can see. If you want to restrict shipment-level access while still showing a summary on Account, Private OWD on Shipment plus Master-Detail helps, because access to shipments is controlled by the Account record.

• A (Public OWD on Shipment with Process Builder and a Lookup to Account): Not ideal. Public access would expose shipments broadly, and a lookup cannot support a built-in roll-up summary.
• B (Private OWD on Shipment, Roll-Up Summary, Master-Detail to Account): Best answer. Private shipments, but because of Master-Detail, access and the roll-up are tied to the Account. The Account can show the yearly total via a Roll-Up Summary field.
• C (Controlled by Parent on Shipment, Trigger, Master-Detail): Master-Detail is correct, but using a trigger is unnecessary for a straightforward roll-up; roll-ups are the standard, maintainable solution.
• D (Private OWD on Shipment, Trigger, Lookup to Account): More complex and not as efficient; no automatic roll-up, and lookup breaks the ease of summarizing by Account.

• Product Owner: May attend, but is not required unless also working as a Developer.
• Scrum Master: May attend to help facilitate or coach, but is not required.
• Developers: Must participate because the event is specifically for them.

• A assigned without var becomes a global variable (in non-strict mode). So after myFunction(), a = 5 is accessible.
• b is declared with var inside the function, so it’s local to that function (function-scoped). It’s not defined in the outer (global) scope.

• console.log(a) prints 5.
• console.log(b) throws a ReferenceError: b is not defined.

• SageMaker endpoint: Not required because the model is being used through Amazon Bedrock.
• SageMaker Model Registry: Used for managing SageMaker models, not for making a Bedrock custom model available.
• Grant access in Amazon Bedrock: IAM permissions may still be needed, but granting access alone does not provide the required inference capacity.

• The target API uses HTTPS, so Mule must validate the server’s TLS certificate.
• The TLS configuration is set to None, meaning no custom truststore is configured.
• Mule therefore uses the JRE’s default truststore to determine whether the target certificate is trusted.
• If the issuing CA certificate is in that truststore, the TLS handshake can succeed.
• If it is absent—or the certificate is otherwise invalid—the request fails with a TLS/handshake error.

• In the source query: apply UPPER() or LOWER() to the column.
• In Power Query Editor: use Text.Upper or Text.Lower on the column, then load.

• This fixes the root cause when comparisons/joins depend on case.
• In DirectQuery, transformations are pushed to the source or query layer; ensure the transformation is supported by your data source/connector.
• After normalization, verify relationships and any downstream visuals that rely on that column.

• 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.

• Approval publish: Request approval from a manager of the knowledge base before moving the article into the publish state.
• Instant Publish: Immediately publishes a draft article without requiring an approval.
• Instant Retire: Immediately retires a published article without requiring an approval.
• Retire Knowledge: Moves a knowledge article to the retired state.

• These are the base knowledge workflows that control how articles move between states (Draft, Published, Retired) and whether approvals are required.
• The other options describe different lifecycle actions, but these four cover the standard publish/retire workflows in ServiceNow.

• What the scenario asks: You have a Power BI semantic model that pulls from multiple sources (Azure SQL Database and SharePoint Online), must support a single dataset for three reports, keep data current (daily refresh by 7 AM PT), and apply RLS to limit sales data by region. You need to choose a storage mode for the tables.

• Correct choice: Dual storage mode.

• Why Dual fits:

• Key concepts:

• The Accrue liability on product receipt flag controls whether a liability is accrued and posted at the time of receiving the item.
• If this checkbox is unchecked, receipts won’t create postings to the Product receipt journal. Enabling it ensures the system posts inventory value and the vendor liability when the item is received.

• Go to the Item model group setup form.
• Enable (check) Accrue liability on product receipt.
• Save.

• The other option, Include physical value, affects how physical value is handled but is not the direct cause of postings to the product receipt journal. If issues persist after enabling accrual, you may need to verify related posting definitions or journal setup.

• Correct answer: enable SLAAC on an interface (C)

• Why the other options are not correct:

• Define the contractor’s deliverables, responsibilities, acceptance criteria, and deadlines.
• Agree on a reporting cadence to monitor progress.
• Allow the local company to use its expertise and manage its own work.

• A: “Under the supervision of the project manager” suggests excessive direct control and is less empowering.
• B: Micromanaging prevents the contractor from functioning independently and is inefficient.
• D: Deploying the contractor’s staff under the PM’s supervision creates a staffing/control arrangement rather than empowering the contracted company.

• Quick context: In a three-tier network (Access, Distribution, Core), roles are:

• Why A is correct: The Distribution layer runs Layer 2 and Layer 3 technologies. It often handles VLAN access (L2) and can perform inter-VLAN routing or connect to the core (L3). So it makes sense for the distribution layer to support both L2 and L3.

• Why B is correct: The Core layer is designed to maintain continuous connectivity when devices fail. It is built for high availability and redundancy, providing multiple paths so the network remains reachable even if some components fail.

• Why the others are not correct:

• The standard Enterprise Architecture domains are: Business, Data, Application, Technology (BDAT).

• A: Business, strategy, application and technology — includes business and application/tech but uses “strategy” instead of data.
• B: Zachman, TOGAF, Cobit, and Heath architectures — names frameworks, not domains.
• C: Business, data, infrastructure and technology — has business, data, and technology; lacks a distinct application domain (uses “infrastructure” instead).
• D: Process, database, software and technology — covers data (database), application (software), and technology, but omits business.

• The four BDAT domains (business, data, application, technology) is the conventional model you should study.
• None of the options perfectly lists all four BDAT domains. The closest are C (if you map infrastructure to technology) and D (data/application/technology but no business).

• Why: Crisis management relies on established, repeatable procedures for responding to an incident (activation of the crisis team, escalation paths, communications, containment actions). This ensures a coordinated, timely, and auditable response.

• Why not the others:

Flat organisation

• Few levels of management
• A wide span of control—managers supervise many employees
• Shorter communication channels
• More employee autonomy and quicker decisions
• Fewer formal promotion levels

Tall organisation

• Many levels of management
• A narrow span of control—managers supervise relatively few employees
• A clear hierarchy and reporting structure
• More formal supervision and communication channels
• More obvious promotion and career stages

• IPsec: Protects traffic at the network layer, commonly for VPNs; it is not WPA2’s authentication protocol.
• SSL: Protects specific application sessions and has largely been replaced by TLS.
• SSH: Secures remote command-line administration.

• The mapping and resolution of endpoint identities (EIDs) to their location (RLOCs) in an SD-Access fabric is handled by the control plane using the LISP protocol.
• Why not the others:

• Server — provides services or resources
• Endpoint — a user device connected to the network
• Ethernet — a networking technology, not a filtering device
• Firewall — filters and controls traffic

• Business
• People
• Governance
• Platform
• Security
• Operations

• Cloud financial management
• Portfolio and program management
• Risk management
• Data governance
• Compliance and oversight

• Which Security policy matches
• Which NAT rule/translation is selected
• Which PBF rule applies
• Which route is used

text 
test security-policy-match ... 
test nat-policy-match ... 
test pbf-policy-match ... 
test routing fib-lookup ...