Architecture and Design (3)

Question 1

You are responsible for database security at your company. You are concerned that programmers might pass badly written SQL commands to the database, or that an attacker might exploit badly written SQL in applications. What is the best way to mitigate this threat?

Programmer training

Agile programming

Stored procedures

Answer 1

Stored procedures

Stored procedures are the best way to have standardized SQL. Rather than programmers writing their own SQL commands, they simply call the stored procedures that the database administrator creates

Question 2

Mary is concerned about application security for her company’s application development. Which of the following is the most important step for addressing application security?

Proper error handling

Regular data backups

Encrypted data transmission

Answer 2

Proper error handling

Proper error handling is the most fundamental item to address in application development. Robust and thorough error handling will mitigate many security risks

Question 3

Farès is responsible for managing the many virtual machines on his company’s networks. Over the past two years, the company has increased the number of virtual machines significantly. Farès is no longer able to effectively manage the large number of machines. What is the term for this situation?

VM overload

VM sprawl

VM spread

Answer 3

VM sprawl

When virtualization reaches the point that IT can no longer effectively manage it, the condition is known as VM sprawl

Question 4

Mary is responsible for virtualization management in her company. She is concerned about VM escape. Which of the following methods would be the most effective in mitigating this risk?

Only share resources between the VM and host if absolutely necessary.

Keep the VM patched.

Use a firewall on the VM.

Answer 4

Only share resources between the VM and host if absolutely necessary.

VM escape is a situation wherein an attacker is able to go through the VM to interact directly with the hypervisor, and potentially the host operating system. The best way to prevent this is to limit the ability of the host and the VM to share resources. If possible, they should not share any resources

Question 5

You work at a large company. You are concerned about ensuring that all workstations have a common configuration, no rogue software is installed, and all patches are kept up to date. Which of the following would be the most effective for accomplishing this?

Use VDE.

Implement strong policies.

Use an image for all workstations.

Answer 5

Use VDE.

The correct answer is to implement a virtual desktop environment. If all the desktops are virtualized, then from a single central location you can manage patches, configuration, and software installation. This single implementation will solve all the issues mentioned in the question

Question 6

Juan is responsible for the physical security of the company server room. He has been asked to recommend a type of fire suppression system for the server room. Which of the following would be the best choice?

Wet pipe

Deluge

Pre-action

Answer 6

Pre-action

Pre-action fire suppression is ideal for computers. The pipes have no water in them during normal operations. When the temperature rises to a certain level, water fills the pipes. Then if the temperature continues to rise, the fire suppression system activates. This provides time to stop the fire before the servers are soaked with water

Question 7

You are responsible for server room security for your company. You are concerned about physical theft of the computers. Which of the following would be best able to detect theft or attempted theft?

Motion sensor–activated cameras

Smart card access to the server rooms

Strong deadbolt locks for the server rooms

Answer 7

Motion sensor–activated cameras

The correct answer is to have a motion-activated camera that records everyone who enters the server room

Question 8

Teresa has deployed session tokens on her network. These would be most effective against which of the following attacks?

DDoS

Replay

SYN flood

Answer 8

Replay

Session tokens are used to authenticate sessions. These can be effective against replay attacks and session hijacking

Question 9

Hector is using infrared cameras to verify that servers in his datacenter are being properly racked. Which of the following datacenter elements is he concerned about?

EMI blocking

Humidity control

Hot and cold aisles

Answer 9

Hot and cold aisles

Hot aisle/cold aisle is a layout design for server racks and other computing equipment in a data center. The goal of a hot aisle/cold aisle configuration is to conserve energy and lower cooling costs by managing airflow. An infrared camera will detect heat levels on the aisles

Question 10

Gerald is concerned about unauthorized people entering the company’s building. Which of the following would be most effective in preventing this?

Alarm systems

Cameras

Security guards

Answer 10

Security guards

A security guard is the most effective way to prevent unauthorized access to a building

Question 11

Which of the following is the most important benefit from implementing SDN?

It will stop malware.

It provides scalability.

It will detect intrusions.

Answer 11

It provides scalability.

Software-defined networking makes the network very scalable. It is relatively easy to add on new resources or remove unneeded resources

Question 12

Mark is an administrator for a health care company. He has to support an older, legacy application. He is concerned that this legacy application might have vulnerabilities that would affect the rest of the network. What is the most efficient way to mitigate this?

Use an application container.

Implement SDN.

Run the application on a separate VLAN.

Answer 12

Use an application container.

The correct answer is to use an application container to isolate that application from the host operating system. Applications containers provide a virtualized environment in which to run an application

Question 13

Lars is auditing the physical security of a company. The company uses chain-link fences on its perimeter. The fence is over pavement, not soft ground. How close to the ground should the bottom of the fence be?

Touching the ground

Within 4 inches

Within 2 inches

Answer 13

Within 2 inches

The fence should reach within 2 inches of hard surfaces like pavement or concrete. For soft dirt it should actually go into the ground

Question 14

Mia has to deploy and support a legacy application. The configuration for this application and the OS it runs on are very specific and cannot be changed. What is the best approach for her to deploy this?

Use an immutable server.

Use a VM.

Set permissions on the application so it cannot be changed.

Answer 14

Use an immutable server.

An immutable server’s configuration cannot be changed

Question 15

To mitigate the impact of a software vendor going out of business, a company that uses vendor software should require which one of the following?

A detailed credit investigation prior to acquisition

A third-party source-code escrow

Substantial penalties for breach of contract

Answer 15

A third-party source-code escrow

The correct answer is to have the source code for the application stored with a third-party source code escrow. Should the vendor go out of business, or otherwise be unable to continue to support the application, the source code escrow will supply you with the source code you can then maintain yourself (or hire a new company)

Question 16

Abigail is responsible for datacenters in a large, multinational company. She has to support multiple datacenters in diverse geographic regions. What would be the most effective way for her to manage these centers consistently across the enterprise?

Hire datacenter managers for each center.

Implement enterprise-wide SDN.

Implement Infrastructure as Code (IaC).

Answer 16

Implement Infrastructure as Code (IaC).

The correct answer is to implement IaC. Infrastructure as Code (IaC) is the process of managing and provisioning computer datacenters through machine-readable definition files, rather than physical hardware configuration or interactive configuration tools. Whether the data center(s) use physical machines or virtual machines, this is an effective way to manage the data centers

Question 17

Olivia is responsible for web application security for her company’s e-commerce server. She is particularly concerned about XSS and SQL injection. Which technique would be most effective in mitigating these attacks?

Proper error handling

The use of stored procedures

Proper input validation

Answer 17

Proper input validation

These particular web application attacks are best mitigated with proper input validation. Any user input should be checked for indicators of XSS or SQL injection

Question 18

Sophia wants to test her company’s web application to see if it is handling input validation and data validation properly. Which testing method would be most effective for this?

Static code analysis

Fuzzing

Baselining

Answer 18

Fuzzing

Fuzzing is a technique whereby the tester intentionally enters incorrect values into input fields to see how the application will handle it

Question 19

Omar is using the waterfall method for software development in his company. Which of the following is the proper sequence for the waterfall method?

Requirements, design, implementation, testing, deployment, maintenance

Planning, designing, coding, testing, deployment

Requirements, planning, designing, coding, testing, deployment

Answer 19

Requirements, design, implementation, testing, deployment, maintenance

The waterfall method has the steps of requirements gathering, design, implementation (also called coding), testing (also called verification), deployment, and maintenance

Question 20

Lilly is responsible for security on web applications for her company. She is checking to see that all applications have robust input validation. What is the best way to implement validation?

Client-side validation

Validate in transit

Client-side and server-side validation

Answer 20

Client-side and server-side validation

Both client-side and server-side validation are important, so both should be used for a complete validation solution

Question 21

Edward is responsible for web application security at a large insurance company. One of the applications that he is particularly concerned about is used by insurance adjusters in the field. He wants to have strong authentication methods to mitigate misuse of the application. What would be his best choice?

Authenticate the client with a digital certificate.

Implement a very strong password policy.

Secure application communication with TLS.

Answer 21

Authenticate the client with a digital certificate.

The correct answer is to assign digital certificates to the authorized users and to use these to authenticate them when logging in. This is an effective way to ensure that only authorized users can access the application

Question 22

Sarah is the CIO for a small company. The company uses several custom applications that have complicated interactions with the host operating system. She is concerned about ensuring that systems on her network are all properly patched. What is the best approach in her environment?

Implement automatic patching.

Delegate patch management to managers of departments so they can find the best patch management for their departments.

Immediately deploy patches to a test environment, then as soon as testing is complete have a staged rollout to the network.

Answer 22

Immediately deploy patches to a test environment, then as soon as testing is complete have a staged rollout to the network.

The correct answer is to first test patches. It is always possible that a patch might cause issues for one or more current applications. This is particularly a concern with applications that have a lot of interaction with the host operating system. An operating system patch can prevent the application from executing properly. But as soon as the patches are tested, a phased rollout to the company should begin

Question 23

John is examining the logs for his company’s web applications. He discovers what he believes is a breach. After further investigation, it appears as if the attacker executed code from one of the libraries the application uses, code that is no longer even used by the application. What best describes this attack?

Buffer overflow

Code reuse attack

DoS attack

Answer 23

Code reuse attack

In a code reuse attack, the attacker executes code that is meant for some other purposes. In many cases this can be old code that is no longer even used (dead code), even if that code is in a third-party library

Question 24

Emiliano is a network administrator and is concerned about the security of peripheral devices. Which of the following would be a basic step he could take to improve security for those devices?

Implement FDE.

Turn off remote access (SSH, telnet, etc.) if not needed.

Utilize fuzzy testing for all peripherals.

Answer 24

Turn off remote access (SSH, telnet, etc.) if not needed.

The correct answer is to turn off any remote access to such devices that is not absolutely needed. Many peripheral devices come with SSH, telnet, or similar services. If you are not using them, turn them off

Question 25

Ixxia is a software development team manager. She is concerned about memory leaks in code. What type of testing is most likely to find memory leaks?

Fuzzing

Stress testing

Static code analysis

Answer 25

Static code analysis

The correct answer is to use static code analysis. Memory leaks are usually caused by failure to deallocate memory that has been allocated. A static code analyzer can check to see if all memory allocation commands (malloc, alloc, etc.) have a matching deallocation command

Question 26

Victor is a network administrator for a medium-sized company. He wants to be able to access servers remotely so that he can perform small administrative tasks from remote locations. Which of the following would be the best protocol for him to use?

SSH

Telnet

RSH

Answer 26

SSH

The correct answer is to use Secure Shell. This protocol is encrypted. SSH also authenticates the user with public key cryptography

Question 27

Mark is responsible for a server that runs sensitive software for a major research facility. He is very concerned that only authorized software execute on this server. He is also concerned about malware masquerading as legitimate, authorized software. What technique would best address this concern?

Secure boot

Software attestation

Sandboxing

Answer 27

Software attestation

Software attestation is often done with digital certificates and digital signing. The software proves that it is the legitimate program before being allowed to execute

Question 28

Hannah is a programmer with a large software company. She is interested in ensuring that the module she just created will work well with a module created by another program. What type of testing is this?

Unit testing

Stress testing

Integration testing

Answer 28

Integration testing

When two or more components are tested together, this is referred to as integration testing

Question 29

Erik is responsible for the security of a SCADA system. Availability is a critical issue. Which of the following is most important to implement?

SIEM

IPS

Automated patch control

Answer 29

IPS

Intrusion prevention systems are critical for a system that needs high availability. Depending on the nature of the system, it may require an HIPS, NIPS, or both

Question 30

You are concerned about the security of new devices your company has implemented. Some of these devices use SoC technology. What would be the best security measure you could take for these?

Using a TPM

Ensuring each has its own cryptographic key

Using BIOS protection

Answer 30

Ensuring each has its own cryptographic key

System on a Chip devices are complete self-contained systems on a single chip. Therefore, having their own unique cryptographic keys is the best way to implement authentication and security