Domain 3 - Security Architecture & Engineering Flashcards
Matthew is the security administrator for a consulting firm and
must enforce access controls that restrict users’ access based
upon their previous activity. For example, once a consultant
accesses data belonging to Acme Cola, a consulting client, they
may no longer access data belonging to any of Acme’s
competitors. What security model best fits Matthew’s needs?
A. Clark-Wilson
B. Biba
C. Bell-LaPadula
D. Brewer-Nash
D. Brewer-Nash
D. The Brewer-Nash model allows access controls to change
dynamically based upon a user’s actions. It is often used in
environments like Matthew’s to implement a “Chinese wall”
between data belonging to different clients.
What is the earliest stage of a fire where it is possible to use detection technology to identify it?
A. Incipient
B. Smoke
C. Flame
D. Heat
A. Incipient
A. Fires may be detected as early as the incipient stage. During
this stage, air ionization takes place, and specialized incipient
fire detection systems can identify these changes to provide
early warning of a fire
Ralph is designing a physical security infrastructure for a new
computing facility that will remain largely unstaffed. He plans to
implement motion detectors in the facility but would also like to
include a secondary verification control for physical presence.
Which one of the following would best meet his needs?
A. CCTV
B. IPS
C. Turnstiles
D. Faraday cages
A. CCTV
A. Closed-circuit television (CCTV) systems act as a secondary
verification mechanism for physical presence because they allow
security officials to view the interior of the facility when a
motion alarm sounds to determine the current occupants and
their activities.
Harry would like to retrieve a lost encryption key from a
database that uses m of n control, with m = 4 and n = 8. What is
the minimum number of escrow agents required to retrieve the
key?
A. 2
B. 4
C. 8
D. 12
B. 4
B. In an m of n control system, at least m of n possible escrow
agents must collaborate to retrieve an encryption key from the
escrow database.
Fran’s company is considering purchasing a web-based email
service from a vendor and eliminating its own email server
environment as a cost-saving measure. What type of cloud
computing environment is Fran’s company considering?
A. SaaS
B. IaaS
C. CaaS
D. PaaS
A. SaaS
A. This is an example of a vendor offering a fully functional
application as a web-based service. Therefore, it fits under the
definition of software as a service (SaaS). In infrastructure as a
service (IaaS), compute as a service (CaaS), and platform as a
service (PaaS) approaches, the customer provides their own
software. In this example, the vendor is providing the email
software, so none of those choices is appropriate.
Bob is a security administrator with the U.S. federal government
and wants to choose a digital signature approach that is an
approved part of the federal Digital Signature Standard under
FIPS 186-4. Which one of the following encryption algorithms is
not an acceptable choice for use in digital signatures?
A. DSA
B. HAVAL
C. RSA
D. ECDSA
B. HAVAL
B. The Digital Signature Standard approves three encryption
algorithms for use in digital signatures: the Digital Signature
Algorithm (DSA); the Rivest, Shamir, Adleman (RSA) algorithm;
and the Elliptic Curve DSA (ECDSA) algorithm. HAVAL is a
hash function, not an encryption algorithm. While hash
functions are used as part of the digital signature process, they
do not provide encryption.
Harry would like to access a document owned by Sally and
stored on a file server. Applying the subject/object model to this
scenario, who or what is the subject of the resource request?
A. Harry
B. Sally
C. Server
D. Document
A. Harry
A. In the subject/object model of access control, the user or
process making the request for a resource is the subject of that
request. In this example, Harry is requesting resource access
and is, therefore, the subject.
Michael is responsible for forensic investigations and is
investigating a medium-severity security incident that involved
the defacement of a corporate website. The web server in
question ran on a virtualization platform, and the marketing
team would like to get the website up and running as quickly as
possible. What would be the most reasonable next step for
Michael to take?
A. Keep the website offline until the investigation is complete.
B. Take the virtualization platform offline as evidence.
C. Take a snapshot of the compromised system and use that for the investigation.
D. Ignore the incident and focus on quickly restoring the website.
C. Take a snapshot of the compromised system and use that for the investigation.
C. Michael should conduct his investigation, but there is a
pressing business need to bring the website back online. The
most reasonable course of action would be to take a snapshot of
the compromised system and use the snapshot for the
investigation, restoring the website to operation as quickly as
possible while using the results of the investigation to improve
the security of the site.
Helen is a software engineer and is developing code that she
would like to restrict to running within an isolated sandbox for
security purposes. What software development technique is
Helen using?
A. Bounds
B. Input validation
C. Confinement
D. TCB
C. Confinement
C. Using a sandbox is an example of confinement, where the
system restricts the access of a particular process to limit its
ability to affect other processes running on the same system.
What concept describes the degree of confidence that an
organization has that its controls satisfy security requirements?
A. Trust
B. Credentialing
C. Verification
D. Assurance
D. Assurance
D. Assurance is the degree of confidence that an organization
has that its security controls are correctly implemented. It must
be continually monitored and reverified.
What type of security vulnerability are developers most likely to
introduce into code when they seek to facilitate their own access,
for testing purposes, to software they developed?
A. Maintenance hook
B. Cross-site scripting
C. SQL injection
D. Buffer overflow
A. Maintenance hook
A. Maintenance hooks, otherwise known as backdoors, provide
developers with easy access to a system, bypassing normal
security controls. If not removed prior to finalizing code, they
pose a significant security vulnerability if an attacker discovers
the maintenance hook.
Sally is blocked from reading a file due to the Biba integrity model. Sally has a Secret security clearance, and the file has a Confidential classification. What
principle of the Biba model is being enforced?
A. Simple Security Property
B. Simple Integrity Property
C. *-Security Property
D. *-Integrity Property
B. Simple Integrity Property
B. The Simple Integrity Property states that an individual may
not read a file classified at a lower security level than the
individual’s security clearance.
Tom is responsible for maintaining the security of systems used
to control industrial processes located within a power plant.
What term is used to describe these systems?
A. POWER
B. SCADA
C. HAVAL
D. COBOL
B. SCADA
B. Supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems
are used to control and gather data from industrial processes.
They are commonly found in power plants and other industrial
environments.
Sonia recently removed an encrypted hard drive from a laptop
and moved it to a new device because of a hardware failure. She
is having difficulty accessing encrypted content on the drive
despite the fact that she knows the user’s password. What
hardware security feature is likely causing this problem?
A. TCB
B. TPM
C. NIACAP
D. RSA
B. TPM
B. The Trusted Platform Module (TPM) is a hardware security
technique that stores an encryption key on a chip on the
motherboard and prevents someone from accessing an
encrypted drive by installing it in another computer.
Chris wants to verify that a software package that he
downloaded matches the original version. What hashing tool
should he use if he believes that technically sophisticated
attackers may have replaced the software package with a version
containing a backdoor?
A. MD5
B. 3DES
C. SHA1
D. SHA 256
D. SHA 256
D. Intentional collisions have been created with MD5, and a
real-world collision attack against SHA 1was announced in early
2017. 3DES is not a hashing tool, leaving SHA 256 (sometimes
called SHA 2) as the only real choice that Chris has in this list.
Alice and Bob would like to use an asymmetric cryptosystem to
communicate with each other. They are located in different parts
of the country but have exchanged encryption keys by using
digital certificates signed by a mutually trusted certificate
authority.
If Alice wants to send Bob a message that is encrypted for
confidentiality, what key does she use to encrypt the message?
A. Alice’s public key
B. Alice’s private key
C. Bob’s public key
D. Bob’s private key
C. Bob’s public key
C. In an asymmetric cryptosystem, the sender of a message
encrypts the message using the recipient’s public key. The
recipient may then decrypt that message using their own private
key, which only they should possess.
Alice and Bob would like to use an asymmetric cryptosystem to
communicate with each other. They are located in different parts
of the country but have exchanged encryption keys by using
digital certificates signed by a mutually trusted certificate
authority.
When Bob receives the encrypted message from Alice, what key
does he use to decrypt the message’s plaintext content?
A. Alice’s public key
B. Alice’s private key
C. Bob’s public key
D. Bob’s private key
D. Bob’s private key
D. When Bob receives the message, he uses his own private key
to decrypt it. Since he is the only one with his private key, he is
the only one who should be able to decrypt it, thus preserving
confidentiality.
Alice and Bob would like to use an asymmetric cryptosystem to
communicate with each other. They are located in different parts
of the country but have exchanged encryption keys by using
digital certificates signed by a mutually trusted certificate
authority.
Which one of the following keys would Bob not possess in this
scenario?
A. Alice’s public key
B. Alice’s private key
C. Bob’s public key
D. Bob’s private key
B. Alice’s private key
B. Each user retains their private key as secret information. In
this scenario, Bob would only have access to his own private key
and would not have access to the private key of Alice or any
other user.
Alice and Bob would like to use an asymmetric cryptosystem to
communicate with each other. They are located in different parts
of the country but have exchanged encryption keys by using
digital certificates signed by a mutually trusted certificate
authority.
Alice would also like to digitally sign the message that she sends
to Bob. What key should she use to create the digital signature?
A. Alice’s public key
B. Alice’s private key
C. Bob’s public key
D. Bob’s private key
B. Alice’s private key
B. Alice creates the digital signature using her own private key.
Then Bob, or any other user, can verify the digital signature
using Alice’s public key.
What name is given to the random value added to a password in
an attempt to defeat rainbow table attacks?
A. Hash
B. Salt
C. Extender
D. Rebar
B. Salt
B. The salt is a random value added to a password before it is
hashed by the operating system. The salt is then stored in a
password file with the hashed password. This increases the
complexity of cryptanalytic attacks by negating the usefulness of
attacks that use precomputed hash values, such as rainbow
tables
Which one of the following is not an attribute of a hashing
algorithm?
A. They require a cryptographic key.
B. They are irreversible.
C. It is very difficult to find two messages with the same hash
value.
D. They take variable-length input
A. They require a cryptographic key.
A. Hash functions do not include any element of secrecy and,
therefore, do not require a cryptographic key.
What type of fire suppression system fills with water after a
valve opens when the initial stages of a fire are detected and
then requires a sprinkler head heat activation before dispensing
water?
A. Wet pipe
B. Dry pipe
C. Deluge
D. Preaction
D. Preaction
D. A preaction fire suppression system activates in two steps.
The pipes fill with water once the early signs of a fire are
detected. The system does not dispense water until heat sensors
on the sprinkler heads trigger the second phase.
Susan would like to configure IPsec in a manner that provides
confidentiality for the content of packets. What component of
IPsec provides this capability?
A. AH
B. ESP
C. IKE
D. ISAKMP
B. ESP
B. The Encapsulating Security Payload (ESP) protocol provides
confidentiality and integrity for packet contents. It encrypts
packet payloads and provides limited authentication and
protection against replay attacks.
Which one of the following cryptographic goals protects against
the risks posed when a device is lost or stolen?
A. Nonrepudiation
B. Authentication
C. Integrity
D. Confidentiality
D. Confidentiality
D. The greatest risk when a device is lost or stolen is that
sensitive data contained on the device will fall into the wrong
hands. Confidentiality protects against this risk. Nonrepudiation
is when the recipient of a message can prove the originator’s
identity to a third party. Authentication is a means of proving
one’s identity. Integrity demonstrates that information has not
been modified since transmission