PCNE Practice Test 5 — 10 Questions

Question 1

A company uses Cloud Armor to protect an HTTPS Load Balancer. They notice that legitimate traffic from a specific geographic region is being blocked. The security policy has a deny rule for that region. What is the correct way to allow traffic from that region while still protecting against attacks?

Accepted Answer

Add a new allow rule for that region with a lower priority number than the deny rule. Cloud Armor security rules are evaluated in order of priority, where a lower priority number means higher precedence. To allow traffic from a specific region that is currently blocked by a deny rule, you must add an allow rule with a lower priority number (e.g., 100) than the deny rule (e.g., 1000). This ensures the allow rule is evaluated first, permitting the legitimate traffic before the deny rule can block it, while the deny rule still protects against attacks from other regions.

Answer

Remove the deny rule for that region and rely on other security measures

Answer

Remove all rules and add a single allow rule for the legitimate region

Answer

Reorder the rules so that the deny rule is at the bottom of the list

Question 2

An organization wants to restrict access to a Cloud Storage bucket so that only VMs within a specific VPC network can download objects. They are using VPC Service Controls and Private Google Access. Which configuration is required?

Accepted Answer

Enable Private Google Access on the subnet and create a VPC Service Controls perimeter that includes the bucket project. D is correct because VPC Service Controls create a security perimeter around the Cloud Storage bucket's project, preventing data exfiltration even if the bucket is publicly accessible. Private Google Access on the subnet allows VMs to reach Google APIs (including storage.googleapis.com) via internal IPs, avoiding the public internet. Together, they ensure only VMs within the specified VPC network can download objects, as the perimeter restricts access to authorized networks and Private Google Access provides the private connectivity path.

Answer

Enable Cloud NAT and configure a firewall rule to allow egress to 0.0.0.0/0

Answer

Configure a Service Directory endpoint and attach an IAM policy to the bucket allowing access only from that endpoint

Answer

Create a firewall rule allowing egress to the storage.googleapis.com service IP range and enable VPC flow logs

Question 3

A company with a hub-and-spoke VPC topology uses Shared VPC and VPC Network Peering. They want to ensure that only specific VMs in a spoke project can connect to a database instance in the hub project. What is the most secure approach?

Accepted Answer

Use Private Service Connect to publish the database as a managed service and create a Private Service Connect endpoint in the spoke VPC with IAM permissions for the specific VM service accounts. Option C is correct because Private Service Connect (PSC) allows you to publish a managed service (like Cloud SQL) and create a PSC endpoint in the spoke VPC. By combining the PSC endpoint with IAM permissions on the VM service accounts, you ensure that only specific VMs can connect to the database, providing fine-grained, identity-aware access control without exposing the database to the entire network.

Answer

Deploy the Cloud SQL Auth Proxy on each VM and configure IAM permissions for each VM's service account

Answer

Use Shared VPC and assign the specific VMs to a subnet with a dedicated secondary IP range, then restrict database access to that range

Answer

Configure firewall rules in the hub project to allow traffic only from the specific VM internal IPs

Question 4

A company is using Cloud NAT for outbound internet access. They want to ensure that traffic from certain VMs always uses a specific set of NAT IPs for auditing purposes. Which three steps are necessary to achieve this? (Choose THREE.)

Accepted Answer

Ensure the VMs have a default route (0.0.0.0/0) with next hop set to the Cloud NAT gateway's subnet. Option A is correct because for Cloud NAT to function, the VM must have a default route (0.0.0.0/0) that points to the Cloud NAT gateway's subnet as the next hop. Without this route, the VM's outbound traffic will not be directed to the NAT gateway, and the NAT IPs will not be used. This ensures that traffic from the VM is routed through the NAT gateway, allowing the specific set of NAT IPs to be applied for auditing.

Answer

Configure IAM conditions on the Cloud NAT resource to restrict which VMs can use it

Answer

Enable VPC Flow Logs on the subnet to monitor which NAT IPs are used

Question 5

Refer to the exhibit. A user cannot SSH into test-vm from their workstation (public IP 203.0.113.5) using the VM's external IP 34.67.89.10. The firewall rule allow-ssh exists. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The firewall rule allow-ssh is missing a source IP range or has a source IP range that does not include the user's IP. The most likely cause is that the firewall rule 'allow-ssh' is missing a source IP range or has a source IP range that does not include the user's public IP (203.0.113.5). In Google Cloud, firewall rules are stateful and by default deny all ingress traffic unless explicitly allowed; without a source IP range (or with an incorrect one), the SSH traffic from the user's workstation is dropped at the VPC firewall level, preventing access to the VM's external IP (34.67.89.10).

Answer

The firewall rule allow-ssh is for the wrong network

Answer

The firewall rule allow-ssh is disabled

Answer

The VM's external IP (34.67.89.10) is blocked by Cloud NAT

Question 6

Which TWO of the following are valid methods to reduce latency between users in Europe and a GCP-hosted application?

Accepted Answer

Use Cloud CDN to cache content at edge locations.. Cloud CDN uses Google's globally distributed edge caches to serve content from locations closer to users, reducing round-trip time and latency. For users in Europe, cached static or dynamic content is delivered from a nearby edge PoP, bypassing the need to fetch from the origin server in a potentially distant region.

Answer

Establish a Cloud VPN tunnel to the user's ISP.

Answer

Use Premium Tier networking instead of Standard Tier.

Answer

Use Cloud NAT for outbound traffic.

Question 7

Based on the exhibit, what is the purpose of Cloud Router's BGP configuration?

Accepted Answer

To advertise the VPC's IP range to the on-premises network.. Cloud Router uses BGP to dynamically exchange routes between a VPC network and an on-premises network over a VPN tunnel or Dedicated Interconnect. In this configuration, the purpose is to advertise the VPC's IP range (the custom or auto-mode subnet CIDR) to the on-premises router, enabling on-premises hosts to route traffic back to the VPC. This is achieved by configuring the Cloud Router with a BGP session and setting the advertised route for the VPC's IP range.

Answer

To load balance traffic across multiple VPN tunnels.

Answer

To receive a default route from the on-premises network.

Answer

To advertise a default route to the on-premises network.

Question 8

Which THREE of the following are requirements for implementing a Global External HTTP(S) Load Balancer with an external backend?

Accepted Answer

The backend must support health checks from the load balancer's health check IP ranges.. Option B is correct because Global External HTTP(S) Load Balancers use Google's frontend (proxying) IP ranges to send health checks to backends. The backend must allow inbound traffic from these specific health check IP ranges (e.g., 35.191.0.0/16 and 130.211.0.0/22) to receive health probes; otherwise, the load balancer will mark the backend as unhealthy and stop forwarding traffic.

Answer

The backend must be configured with Private Google Access.

Answer

The backend must have an SSL certificate installed.

Question 9

A company is deploying an internal load balancer (ILB) in a VPC to distribute traffic among backend instances in a managed instance group. The ILB should only be accessible from within the VPC. Which of the following is a required step when configuring the ILB?

Accepted Answer

Specify a subnet in the same region as the backend instances.. An internal load balancer (ILB) in GCP requires a regional forwarding rule that routes traffic to backend instances within the same VPC. Specifying a subnet in the same region as the backend instances is mandatory because the ILB's internal IP address is allocated from that subnet, and the forwarding rule must reference a subnet to enable internal-only routing. Without a subnet, the ILB cannot be provisioned as an internal load balancer.

Answer

Assign a static external IP address to the forwarding rule.

Answer

Upload an SSL certificate to the load balancer.

Answer

Create a Cloud NAT gateway for the backend instances.

Question 10

A company is planning to migrate their on-premises application to Google Cloud. The application requires consistent high bandwidth and low latency to on-premises databases. They have a Dedicated Interconnect connection with a 10 Gbps link. To improve availability, they decide to add a second Interconnect connection. Which of the following is a best practice for configuring BGP sessions?

Accepted Answer

Configure two BGP sessions, each on a separate connection, with different ASNs and MED values to influence path selection. Option B is correct because using different ASNs on each BGP session allows the on-premises router to treat the two Dedicated Interconnect connections as separate routing peers, enabling path selection control via MED values. This ensures that if one connection fails, traffic can be rerouted through the other, improving availability without relying on ECMP or a single session, which would not provide the desired redundancy and traffic engineering.

Answer

Configure two BGP sessions with the same ASN and MED values

Answer

Enable ECMP across the two connections with a single BGP session

Answer

Use a single BGP session across both connections