View Full Cisco CCNP Security 300-745 Exam Dumps and Practice Test Dumps.

Q1. An organization has employees who frequently work from unmanaged home networks and access both SaaS and private applications. Which security design best follows a zero-trust approach?

1. Permit access whenever the source IP address belongs to the user’s ISP
   2. Continuously evaluate user identity, device posture, and application access context
   3. Allow all authenticated employees unrestricted internal network access
   4. Require users to change passwords every 24 hours without evaluating device health

Correct Answer: 2. Continuously evaluate user identity, device posture, and application access context

Explanation: Zero-trust architecture avoids making access decisions solely because a user is authenticated or connected from a particular network. Access should be based on multiple contextual signals, including identity, device posture, requested resource, location, risk, and other available intelligence. Continuous evaluation can also detect changes in trust after the initial authentication. Granting broad internal access after one login conflicts with least privilege. Source IP addresses are weak trust indicators for hybrid workers, and frequent password changes alone do not provide the contextual verification needed for modern remote-access security.

Q2. A company needs a site-to-site VPN between two fixed offices. Confidentiality and integrity of IP traffic are mandatory, and interoperability with different vendors is important. Which technology is most appropriate?

1. GRE without encryption
   2. MPLS only
   3. HTTP tunneling
   4. IPsec

Correct Answer: 4. IPsec

Explanation: IPsec is designed to provide confidentiality, integrity, authentication, and anti-replay protection for IP traffic. It is widely supported across networking vendors and is commonly used for secure site-to-site VPNs. GRE provides flexible tunneling and support for additional traffic types but does not provide encryption by itself. MPLS can provide traffic separation through a service-provider network, but it does not inherently encrypt customer traffic. HTTP tunneling is not the standard choice for secure site-to-site connectivity. IPsec therefore best meets the requirement for interoperable encrypted connectivity between two fixed sites.

Q3. Which security control is most appropriate for protecting an Internet-facing web application from attacks such as SQL injection and malicious HTTP requests?

1. Web Application Firewall
   2. Layer 2 access switch
   3. MPLS provider edge router
   4. DNS caching server

Correct Answer: 1. Web Application Firewall

Explanation: A Web Application Firewall, or WAF, is specifically designed to inspect HTTP and HTTPS application traffic and protect web applications against attacks such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting, malicious request patterns, and application-layer abuse. A traditional network firewall can enforce IP addresses, ports, and other network controls but may lack the application-specific awareness necessary for detailed web protection. Layer 2 switches, provider routers, and DNS caching servers do not perform the specialized inspection required. A WAF should normally be part of a broader layered design that also includes secure coding, patching, authentication, and monitoring.

Q4. A security architect wants to reduce the impact of a compromised container on other application components in the same cloud-native environment. Which design principle is most effective?

1. Place all containers in one unrestricted network segment
   2. Disable workload logging
   3. Apply microsegmentation between workloads and services
   4. Allow every container to communicate with every database

Correct Answer: 3. Apply microsegmentation between workloads and services

Explanation: Microsegmentation limits communication between workloads according to explicit policy. In a containerized or microservices environment, this can prevent a compromised service from freely moving laterally to other workloads, databases, or management systems. Policies can be based on workload identity, service role, namespace, labels, or other application context rather than broad network location alone. A flat network increases the blast radius of a compromise. Disabling logging also reduces visibility and incident-response capability. Effective microsegmentation therefore supports least privilege and containment while still permitting legitimate service-to-service communication required by the application.

Q5. An enterprise wants to reduce business email compromise caused by attackers impersonating executives. Which combination provides the strongest architectural improvement?

1. Increase mailbox storage quotas
   2. Disable all inbound email attachments
   3. Permit messages only during business hours
   4. Deploy strong email authentication, anti-phishing controls, and user identity protection

Correct Answer: 4. Deploy strong email authentication, anti-phishing controls, and user identity protection

Explanation: Business email compromise frequently relies on impersonation, account compromise, social engineering, or spoofed domains. A strong design should combine controls rather than depend on one mechanism. Email authentication technologies can help detect spoofing, while anti-phishing analysis can identify suspicious content and behavioral indicators. Strong user authentication helps reduce account takeover, and identity intelligence can detect unusual sign-in behavior. Disabling all attachments would disrupt business operations without stopping text-based fraud. Time restrictions and storage quotas do not meaningfully address impersonation. Layered email and identity security provides the most effective architectural response.

Q6. A security team must inspect encrypted outbound HTTPS traffic for malware while minimizing exposure of sensitive decrypted data. Which design is most appropriate?

1. Use controlled SSL/TLS decryption with policy-based exemptions for sensitive categories
   2. Disable HTTPS across the enterprise
   3. Allow all encrypted traffic without inspection
   4. Replace HTTPS with Telnet

Correct Answer: 1. Use controlled SSL/TLS decryption with policy-based exemptions for sensitive categories

Explanation: TLS decryption allows security controls to inspect content that would otherwise remain hidden inside encrypted sessions. However, decrypting all traffic can introduce privacy, compliance, performance, and certificate-management concerns. A well-designed architecture uses policy-based decryption, inspecting appropriate traffic while exempting categories such as certain healthcare, financial, or legally protected communications where required. The organization should also secure decryption points and limit access to decrypted content. Disabling HTTPS or replacing it with unencrypted protocols would severely weaken security. Allowing all encrypted traffic without inspection can create a blind spot for malware and data exfiltration.

Q7. A company needs dynamic secure connectivity among many branch offices without manually configuring a separate static tunnel between every pair of sites. Which VPN technology best fits the requirement?

1. Static GRE between every branch pair
   2. Plain MPLS with no overlay
   3. DMVPN
   4. Port forwarding

Correct Answer: 3. DMVPN

Explanation: Dynamic Multipoint VPN, or DMVPN, is designed to simplify secure connectivity among many distributed sites. It supports dynamic spoke-to-spoke tunnel creation, reducing the need to manually configure a permanent tunnel between every branch pair. DMVPN commonly combines technologies such as multipoint GRE, NHRP, and IPsec. A full mesh of static GRE tunnels becomes operationally difficult as the number of branches grows and GRE alone does not provide encryption. MPLS may offer provider-managed connectivity but is a different architectural choice and does not inherently satisfy encrypted dynamic overlay requirements. DMVPN is therefore well suited to scalable branch VPN designs.

Q8. Which approach best protects the management plane of routers, firewalls, and switches?

1. Permit administrative access from every production VLAN
   2. Use a dedicated management network with strong authentication and restricted administrative access
   3. Enable Telnet from the Internet
   4. Use shared local administrator credentials on all devices

Correct Answer: 2. Use a dedicated management network with strong authentication and restricted administrative access

Explanation: Infrastructure management interfaces are high-value targets because compromise can give attackers control over security and network devices. A sound design isolates management traffic from ordinary user and application traffic, restricts access to authorized administrative systems, uses encrypted management protocols, and applies strong authentication such as MFA where possible. Centralized AAA and detailed logging further improve accountability. Exposing management services broadly or using shared credentials increases attack surface and makes attribution difficult. A dedicated management network is therefore an important architectural control for protecting the infrastructure management plane.

Q9. Which security solution is best suited to preventing sensitive customer data from being uploaded to unauthorized cloud-storage services?

1. Data Loss Prevention
   2. GRE tunneling
   3. Dynamic routing
   4. NTP authentication

Correct Answer: 1. Data Loss Prevention

Explanation: Data Loss Prevention, or DLP, identifies sensitive information and applies policy to prevent unauthorized disclosure or movement. Depending on the architecture, DLP can inspect data in use, in motion, or at rest and can apply controls to web uploads, email, endpoints, and supported SaaS services. Policies may recognize regulated data through patterns, classifications, labels, or contextual information. GRE, routing protocols, and NTP authentication do not inspect business data for sensitive content. DLP is therefore the most relevant control when an organization wants to prevent users from uploading protected information to unauthorized external services.

Q10. A company is designing security for serverless functions that communicate with managed cloud databases. Which principle should receive the highest priority?

1. Give each function full administrator permissions
   2. Share one permanent credential across all functions
   3. Disable cloud audit logs
   4. Assign least-privilege identities and permissions to each function

Correct Answer: 4. Assign least-privilege identities and permissions to each function

Explanation: Serverless functions should receive only the permissions required to perform their intended tasks. Cloud-native identity mechanisms and short-lived credentials are preferable to shared, long-lived secrets. If one function is compromised, least-privilege permissions can limit access to databases, storage, queues, APIs, and other cloud services, reducing the blast radius. Giving every function administrator rights creates unnecessary risk, while shared permanent credentials make rotation and attribution difficult. Disabling audit logs further reduces detection and investigation capabilities. Strong workload identity combined with least privilege is therefore fundamental to secure serverless architecture.

Q11. A SOC analyst receives an alert indicating possible credential theft on an executive’s endpoint. What should the incident-response process do first after validating that the alert is credible?

1. Delete every log related to the endpoint
   2. Contain the affected asset and prevent further unauthorized activity
   3. Publicly disclose the incident immediately
   4. Reimage every endpoint in the organization

Correct Answer: 2. Contain the affected asset and prevent further unauthorized activity

Explanation: Once an alert has been validated as a credible security incident, containment is typically a critical next action. The objective is to limit damage, prevent lateral movement, block continued credential abuse, and preserve the ability to investigate. Depending on the situation, containment might involve isolating the endpoint, disabling or resetting credentials, revoking sessions, or blocking malicious infrastructure. Evidence should be preserved rather than deleted. Reimaging the entire enterprise would be disproportionate and could destroy evidence. External notification requirements are important but depend on legal, regulatory, and organizational processes after the incident is properly assessed.

Q12. Which framework is most directly useful for describing common attacker techniques and mapping defensive coverage against adversary behavior?

1. ITIL
   2. COBIT budgeting model
   3. MITRE ATT&CK
   4. DHCP

Correct Answer: 3. MITRE ATT&CK

Explanation: MITRE ATT&CK provides a structured knowledge base of adversary tactics and techniques observed in real-world attacks. Security architects, SOC teams, and threat hunters can use it to map security controls, detections, incident evidence, and defensive gaps to attacker behavior. It is especially useful for evaluating whether an architecture can detect or mitigate techniques such as credential access, persistence, lateral movement, and command and control. ITIL focuses on service management, and COBIT is a governance framework with a broader business and control scope. DHCP is a network addressing protocol rather than an adversary-behavior framework.

Q13. A risk assessment identifies a legacy application with a critical vulnerability. The application cannot be patched for six months. Which design response best represents risk mitigation?

1. Place compensating controls around the application, such as segmentation and restrictive access policies
   2. Ignore the vulnerability until the patch becomes available
   3. Give all users administrative access to simplify support
   4. Disable security monitoring to reduce alerts

Correct Answer: 1. Place compensating controls around the application, such as segmentation and restrictive access policies

Explanation: When a vulnerability cannot be remediated immediately, compensating controls can reduce the likelihood or impact of exploitation. Appropriate controls may include network segmentation, application-layer protection, strict access control, virtual patching through IPS or WAF capabilities, increased monitoring, and limiting exposure to only required systems. These measures do not eliminate the need for eventual remediation, but they reduce residual risk during the delay. Ignoring the vulnerability leaves the organization exposed, while broad administrator access increases risk. Disabling monitoring removes visibility. Risk mitigation therefore modifies the architecture to reduce exposure until the root vulnerability can be corrected.

Q14. Which framework focuses on security risk management across activities such as categorizing systems, selecting controls, implementing controls, assessing them, authorizing systems, and continuous monitoring?

1. CAPEC only
   2. MPLS
   3. NIST SP 800-37 Risk Management Framework
   4. SMTP

Correct Answer: 3. NIST SP 800-37 Risk Management Framework

Explanation: NIST SP 800-37 defines the Risk Management Framework, or RMF, which organizes security and privacy risk activities across the system lifecycle. It includes steps such as preparation, categorization, control selection, implementation, assessment, authorization, and continuous monitoring. This approach helps organizations integrate risk decisions into system design and ongoing operations rather than treating security as a one-time project. CAPEC catalogs common attack patterns and can support threat understanding, but it does not define the same complete risk-management lifecycle. MPLS and SMTP are networking technologies rather than security governance frameworks.

Q15. A payment-processing company stores and processes cardholder data. Which compliance standard is most directly relevant to protecting that environment?

1. HIPAA only
   2. FERPA
   3. COPPA only
   4. PCI DSS

Correct Answer: 4. PCI DSS

Explanation: The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, or PCI DSS, applies to organizations that store, process, or transmit payment cardholder data and to systems that can affect the security of that environment. It establishes technical and operational security requirements involving access control, segmentation, monitoring, vulnerability management, secure configuration, and data protection. HIPAA focuses on protected health information, FERPA concerns education records in the United States, and COPPA addresses certain privacy requirements involving children. A security architect should map the organization’s business activity and data types to the correct regulatory or industry compliance requirements.

Q16. A security engineering team wants firewall rules, cloud security groups, and network segmentation policies to be deployed consistently through version-controlled templates. Which approach best supports the requirement?

1. Manual CLI configuration on every device
   2. Infrastructure as Code
   3. Shared administrator passwords
   4. Untracked spreadsheet instructions

Correct Answer: 2. Infrastructure as Code

Explanation: Infrastructure as Code, or IaC, represents infrastructure and policy configuration in machine-readable definitions that can be stored in version control, reviewed, tested, and deployed consistently. Security teams can use IaC to manage firewall rules, cloud networking, identity policies, and other infrastructure controls while reducing configuration drift and manual errors. Version control provides change history and supports peer review and rollback. Manual CLI changes and spreadsheet-based procedures are difficult to scale and audit reliably. IaC also integrates naturally with DevSecOps pipelines, automated validation, and policy-as-code practices that help enforce secure architecture during deployment.

Q17. A DevSecOps pipeline builds container images for production. Which security control should be added before deployment to reduce the chance of releasing images with known vulnerabilities?

1. Disable source control
   2. Allow developers to bypass all checks
   3. Automated container image vulnerability scanning
   4. Remove build logs

Correct Answer: 3. Automated container image vulnerability scanning

Explanation: Automated container scanning can identify known vulnerabilities, insecure packages, embedded secrets, and other risk indicators before an image is promoted to production. Integrating scanning into the CI/CD pipeline allows organizations to enforce defined security gates consistently and fail builds when unacceptable risk is detected. The control should be combined with trusted base images, dependency management, software composition analysis, signing, and runtime protections. Allowing bypasses or disabling logging weakens pipeline assurance. Automated scanning moves security checks earlier in the software lifecycle, helping DevSecOps teams identify problems before vulnerable container images are widely deployed.

Q18. A SOC receives thousands of repetitive phishing alerts that require the same enrichment and containment steps. Which technology is best suited to automate this workflow?

1. SOAR
   2. GRE
   3. MPLS
   4. Static routing

Correct Answer: 1. SOAR

Explanation: Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response, or SOAR, platforms can automate repeatable security workflows across multiple systems. For phishing investigations, a SOAR playbook might extract indicators, query threat intelligence, inspect URLs and attachments, search for matching messages, quarantine emails, disable compromised accounts, and create incident records. Automation improves response speed and consistency while allowing analysts to focus on complex cases. Appropriate approval controls should still be used for high-impact actions. GRE, MPLS, and static routing are networking technologies and do not provide incident-response orchestration or automated SOC playbooks.

Q19. Which security concern is most important when an organization allows employees to submit confidential corporate information to public generative AI services?

1. Increased Ethernet collision domains
   2. Potential sensitive-data exposure and loss of control over submitted information
   3. Reduction in IPsec tunnel count
   4. Failure of dynamic routing protocols

Correct Answer: 2. Potential sensitive-data exposure and loss of control over submitted information

Explanation: Public generative AI services can introduce data-governance risks when users submit proprietary code, customer records, internal documents, credentials, or other sensitive information. Depending on the service and contract, submitted data may be retained, logged, processed outside approved regions, or otherwise handled in ways that conflict with organizational policy. Security architects should consider acceptable-use policies, DLP, approved enterprise AI services, data classification, access controls, logging, and vendor risk. Ethernet collisions and routing behavior are unrelated to the core risk. The primary concern is preserving confidentiality and control of sensitive organizational information.

Q20. A security team wants machine-learning analytics to identify unusual account behavior that may indicate a compromised identity. Which data is most valuable as input?

1. Only the user’s job title
   2. Only the endpoint wallpaper
   3. Only the device serial number
   4. Authentication patterns, device context, location, and behavioral telemetry

Correct Answer: 4. Authentication patterns, device context, location, and behavioral telemetry

Explanation: Identity-focused machine learning is most useful when it has rich contextual telemetry. Authentication frequency, impossible travel, unusual devices, location changes, privilege use, access patterns, session behavior, and historical baselines can help analytics identify deviations associated with credential compromise. A job title may contribute context but is insufficient by itself. Wallpaper and hardware serial numbers alone provide little behavioral insight. AI-based detection should also be combined with human investigation, reliable telemetry, tuning, and well-designed response procedures because unusual behavior does not automatically prove malicious activity. Context-rich data improves the quality of identity risk analysis.