AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Associate SAA-C03 Practice Test 28
Question 270
Macie finds credit-card information in an S3 bucket exposed to an external partner. A developer says enabling Macie itself encrypts the affected files and revokes the partner automatically. What follow-up should be recommended?
- Rely on Macie classification as the sole encryption and authorization barrier for payment data.
- Delete all CloudTrail logs to remove references to the discovered sensitive object names.
- Use S3 Standard-IA instead of S3 Standard and assume the storage class automatically denies external partners.
- Review the Macie findings and remediate the bucket access or encryption policies separately according to data sensitivity.
Explanation
Correct Answer
D:Macie identifies sensitive content and related risk; data protection changes still require IAM, S3 encryption and other configured controls. Detection should inform a targeted remediation plan.
Incorrect Answers
A:Classification is evidence about content and location, not an enforcement policy granting or denying access to the object.
B:Removing audit logs would harm accountability and does not change the bucket's exposure or encryption.
C:Storage class affects billing and retrieval, not which principals may access credit-card data.
Question 271
Macie findings identify the exact keys of S3 objects containing government identifiers. The organization wants analysts to triage the findings without exposing those locations to every application developer. Which protection is appropriate?
- Grant every developer account-root access to the security findings so no one is blocked from investigation.
- Restrict access to Macie findings, supporting logs and sensitive object identifiers through scoped IAM permissions.
- Disable all IAM conditions on the report bucket because encrypted S3 objects do not expose metadata.
- Make all Macie reports public-read because findings do not contain actual object content.
Explanation
Correct Answer
B:Sensitive-data discovery output can reveal where protected content resides. Least-privilege access to findings and evidence reduces unnecessary disclosure during remediation.
Incorrect Answers
A:Root permissions provide far more authority than necessary and undermine controlled handling of sensitive-data locations.
C:Encryption at rest does not replace authorization for who can view finding records or their protected object references.
D:Object locations and classification metadata can themselves be sensitive; public reports may guide unauthorized access attempts.
Question 272
A company enabled Macie and now expects that any S3 read of a classified sensitive object is automatically rejected, even from previously authorized roles. Is that how the service protects objects?
- Yes; Macie replaces AWS KMS key policies and prevents all decrypt requests for classified files.
- Yes; enabling Macie automatically inserts explicit Deny statements into all S3 bucket policies for any matching file.
- No; Macie classifies and reports sensitive data, while S3 policies, IAM and encryption controls still enforce access decisions.
- Yes; Macie deletes all objects containing PII immediately, preventing any subsequent reads.
Explanation
Correct Answer
C:Macie is a discovery service, not an inline universal access-deny gate. Access restrictions must be configured through the relevant authorization and data-protection services.
Incorrect Answers
A:KMS authorization remains an independent control. Macie does not automatically take ownership of the keys for discovered data.
B:Macie does not universally rewrite every bucket policy to block classified objects. Such behavior would break legitimate access without an approved remediation plan.
D:Discovery findings do not imply automatic deletion. Data lifecycle actions require separate authorized policy or workflow choices.
Question 273
The security team must identify vulnerable OS packages on supported EC2 instances and container images in an AWS registry. They want findings that can be prioritized for patching; detection itself does not need to install patches. Which service is most appropriate?
- Use Amazon Macie because it is the primary service for discovering CVEs in EC2 installed packages.
- Enable Amazon Inspector for its supported continuous vulnerability assessment of instances and container images.
- Use Shield Standard because DDoS mitigation also performs comprehensive OS package patching.
- Grant all EC2 instances a public IP address so third-party scanners can discover vulnerabilities unauthenticated.
Explanation
Correct Answer
B:Inspector produces vulnerability findings with affected resources and risk context. Engineering or automation still needs to apply patches or replace vulnerable images.
Incorrect Answers
A:Macie focuses on sensitive data in S3 rather than software package and image vulnerability assessment.
C:Shield mitigates supported DDoS attacks and does not inspect or update all guest software packages.
D:Public exposure is unnecessary and unsafe as a substitute for managed authorized vulnerability assessment.
Question 274
An Inspector dashboard lists 400 vulnerabilities. One is actively exploitable in a publicly reachable workload; hundreds are low-risk findings on isolated test images. The remediation team has limited capacity. Which prioritization approach is reasonable?
- Prioritize findings using exploitability, exposure, severity and the affected workload's business context, then plan remediation.
- Treat every unpatched package as equally likely to be exploited within the same hour.
- Disable Inspector because a long finding list increases the average dashboard response time.
- Sort only by package name alphabetically and patch in that order regardless of exposure.
Explanation
Correct Answer
A:Vulnerability remediation should consider actual risk to reachable business systems, not just total finding count. Inspector's supported risk signals can help focus the most urgent exposures.
Incorrect Answers
B:Likelihood and consequence differ across vulnerabilities and deployments. Equal treatment defeats meaningful risk-based triage.
C:Suppressing the detector hides risk without remediating vulnerable software or allocating work effectively.
D:Alphabetical order ignores exploitability and business criticality and may leave a serious exposed vulnerability unaddressed.
Question 275
Inspector reports a critical vulnerable library in a production container image. A developer assumes Inspector itself updates the image in the registry and redeploys healthy containers. Which action is actually required?
- Add more ECS tasks using the same affected image and assume redundancy removes the library vulnerability.
- Take no action because Inspector's scanning process automatically modifies every vulnerable binary in place.
- Feed the finding into an authorized patch/rebuild and deployment workflow, then validate that the vulnerable image is no longer running.
- Disable the container registry's image scanning to reduce the number of reported vulnerabilities.
Explanation
Correct Answer
C:Inspector supplies the evidence and finding status; rebuilding and redeploying patched images is a separate application delivery operation.
Incorrect Answers
A:Scaling copies of the same vulnerable image does not patch the underlying package or reduce exploitability.
B:Inspector is primarily an assessment service. It does not universally rewrite images or replace running tasks for the developer.
D:Fewer visible findings do not make the software safer. The library must be updated in the deployed image.
Question 276
A threat analyst wants to investigate suspicious runtime behavior on EC2, while the platform team wants a list of vulnerable packages in its managed container images. Which service division is accurate?
- Use GuardDuty as the package management system that directly applies all missing updates.
- Use Inspector as the inline firewall that blocks all malicious EC2 network packets.
- Use CloudFront to discover unpatched operating system packages on private EC2 instances.
- Use GuardDuty for supported threat/activity detection and Inspector for software vulnerability assessment and findings.
Explanation
Correct Answer
D:GuardDuty and Inspector answer different questions: suspicious activity versus exposed software defects. Combining them can inform prioritized remediation without conflating outputs.
Incorrect Answers
A:Threat detection does not replace a patching or package management workflow and does not provide Inspector's assessment function.
B:Inspector evaluates vulnerabilities, not every incoming packet as a network firewall. Separate controls enforce traffic restrictions.
C:A CDN caches web responses and cannot inspect all installed OS packages on customer instances.
Question 277
A SaaS provider already publishes a private HTTPS API through an AWS PrivateLink endpoint service backed by a Network Load Balancer. Its allowed-principals list currently includes every AWS principal and connection requests are accepted automatically. The provider must now allow only three approved partner accounts and must verify each new endpoint connection. What should the provider change?
- Leave the wildcard endpoint-service principal permission and automatic acceptance enabled, relying only on partner-owned consumer subnet ACLs.
- Publish the service name in a private Route 53 hosted zone shared with partners, while leaving wildcard service permissions and automatic acceptance intact.
- Replace the endpoint service with full VPC peering to the partners, leaving the provider’s existing endpoint permissions unchanged.
- Restrict endpoint-service permissions to the approved partner AWS principals, require acceptance of endpoint connection requests, and approve only verified requests.
Explanation
Correct Answer
D:PrivateLink endpoint-service allowed principals determine which AWS identities may request an endpoint. Requiring manual acceptance adds provider approval of each connection. Both controls together restrict new consumers to the authorized partners; existing accepted connections should also be inventoried because removing permissions does not automatically sever them.
Incorrect Answers
A:The service provider cannot rely on network ACL configurations owned by consumer accounts to enforce its own approved-account list. Wildcard endpoint-service permissions and automatic acceptance remain too permissive.
B:Private DNS controls name discovery, not who may create and have an endpoint-service connection accepted. Leaving the existing wildcard authorization and automatic acceptance does not meet provider-side access governance.
C:VPC peering extends network routes rather than offering the requested restricted service-only model. It does not solve the already-open PrivateLink endpoint-service permissions and acceptance policy.
Question 278
A consumer's PrivateLink interface endpoint reaches one privately offered API. An engineer assumes that the endpoint automatically supplies route access to every private subnet in the provider's VPC. What is the correct limitation?
- PrivateLink gives service-specific endpoint connectivity, not general VPC-to-VPC routing to all provider addresses.
- PrivateLink works only for S3 objects and cannot expose private application endpoints.
- PrivateLink automatically exchanges the full provider VPC CIDR and creates transitive routing like Transit Gateway.
- A PrivateLink endpoint must be replaced with a public internet gateway for every confidential API call.
Explanation
Correct Answer
A:The endpoint represents the published service, so the consumer cannot use it as an arbitrary transit router to unrelated provider subnets.
Incorrect Answers
B:Supported endpoint services can expose private application services through appropriate network load-balancer integration.
C:PrivateLink endpoint service connectivity does not create full mesh reachability or advertise all private routes.
D:Private service exposure is exactly the use case for PrivateLink; broad public ingress would undermine it.
Question 279
An API provider already serves https://api.example.net publicly and also publishes the API through a Network Load Balancer-backed AWS PrivateLink endpoint service. Partner applications use the existing hostname and cannot change their configuration, but must resolve that same name to interface endpoint private IPs inside their VPCs. The provider owns example.net. What DNS integration is appropriate?
- Add a public DNS A record that points api.example.net at one partner interface endpoint private IP address for every internet user.
- Associate api.example.net as the endpoint service private DNS name, verify domain ownership using the required public DNS TXT record, and enable private DNS on compatible consumer interface endpoints.
- Create an Amazon S3 gateway endpoint in the provider VPC and place its prefix-list identifier in the public api.example.net DNS record.
- Add a Route 53 Resolver outbound endpoint only in the provider VPC and assume consumer VPCs automatically receive a private hosted zone for the unverified name.
Explanation
Correct Answer
B:PrivateLink supports a provider-owned private DNS name after TXT-based domain verification. With supported private DNS enabled for the consumer endpoint, the existing hostname resolves to endpoint ENIs inside the consumer VPC while public clients retain public resolution.
Incorrect Answers
A:A public record pointing to one consumer-owned private IP would not provide reliable public or cross-VPC reachability, and it cannot establish the service provider’s private DNS ownership.
C:An S3 gateway endpoint is a route-table mechanism for S3 service traffic, not a mechanism to map an arbitrary PrivateLink custom HTTPS hostname to an endpoint service.
D:A provider-side Resolver outbound endpoint does not grant domain ownership or automatically create the PrivateLink consumer DNS mapping. The private DNS name must be associated and verified for the endpoint service.
Question 280
A provider wants to publish a privately hosted TCP application to other AWS accounts through supported AWS PrivateLink endpoint services. Its engineers propose using an internet-facing ALB as the endpoint-service backing integration in all cases. What supporting load balancer pattern should they confirm?
- Make the EC2 application publicly reachable and refer customers to its internet hostname.
- Use a Route 53 private hosted zone alone to transport packets from every customer VPC to the provider's backend.
- Use a supported Network Load Balancer-backed endpoint service integration, with the appropriate service permissions and consumer interface endpoints.
- Configure a Gateway Load Balancer endpoint service as the main TCP application publishing interface, assuming its transparent-appliance insertion semantics are identical to an NLB application endpoint service.
Explanation
Correct Answer
C:AWS PrivateLink endpoint services commonly use NLB front ends for published application traffic. The provider must meet the endpoint-service integration's supported load-balancer requirements.
Incorrect Answers
A:Public ingress does not satisfy the desired private cross-account consumption architecture.
B:Private DNS names do not create cross-VPC network connectivity. The endpoint service and consumer interface endpoints remain required.
D:Gateway Load Balancer endpoints serve transparent service insertion for network appliances. Publishing an ordinary privately consumed TCP application uses a supported NLB-backed endpoint service and its consumer interface endpoints.
