CCOA Practice Test 3 — 10 Questions

Question 1

A user reports they cannot access a shared drive following a suspected ransomware infection. What is the immediate containment action according to standard incident response best practices?

Accepted Answer

Isolate the host from the network. Isolating the affected host from the network prevents the ransomware from spreading to other shares or command-and-control servers while preserving local evidence.

Answer

Reboot the server

Answer

Delete the suspicious files

Answer

Change all user passwords

Question 2

During a simulation, you notice a process spawning child processes from 'wmic.exe'. What is this technique often used for?

Accepted Answer

Execution. WMIC is often used for remote execution and discovery in Windows environments.

Answer

Exfiltration

Answer

Collection

Answer

Impact

Question 3

Which THREE of the following are common 'Impact' techniques?

Accepted Answer

Data encrypted for impact. Data destruction, ransomware encryption, and service disruption are all forms of impact.

Answer

Credential access

Answer

Persistence setup

Question 4

A security analyst is mapping organizational assets to the NIST Cybersecurity Framework. Which category is specifically responsible for maintaining the resilience of critical infrastructure?

Accepted Answer

Recover. The NIST CSF Core consists of five functions: Identify, Protect, Detect, Respond, and Recover. Recover is the function focused on resilience and restoring capabilities.

Answer

Detect

Answer

Protect

Answer

Identify

Question 5

Which TWO of the following are examples of 'Initial Access' tactics?

Accepted Answer

Phishing. Phishing and exploiting public-facing applications are two common ways to gain the first foothold in an environment.

Answer

Registry modification

Answer

Screen capture

Answer

Network scanning

Question 6

Which THREE of the following are considered 'Collection' techniques?

Accepted Answer

Screen capture. Screen capture, audio capture, and file collection are all ways to steal data.

Answer

File and directory discovery

Answer

Network scanning

Question 7

You are managing an incident where an adversary is utilizing a 'Living off the Land' (LotL) technique. Which log source is most critical to detect this activity?

Accepted Answer

Process creation logs (e.g., Sysmon Event ID 1). LotL attacks use legitimate system tools like PowerShell or WMI; therefore, process execution logs with command-line arguments are essential.

Answer

Firewall denied logs

Answer

Physical access logs

Answer

SMTP gateway logs

Question 8

When analyzing a memory dump using Volatility 3, which plugin is most effective for detecting code injection in a suspicious process?

Accepted Answer

windows.malfind. The 'windows.malfind' plugin in Volatility 3 is designed to locate injected code segments by scanning for memory regions with suspicious permissions (e.g., PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE).

Answer

windows.info

Answer

windows.netscan

Answer

windows.pstree

Question 9

Which of these is a 'Defense Evasion' technique?

Accepted Answer

Masquerading as a system process. Using masquerading (renaming files to look like system files) is a common way to hide malicious processes.

Answer

Creating a scheduled task

Answer

Stealing a hash

Answer

Scanning ports

Question 10

Which TWO of the following are examples of 'Discovery' techniques?

Accepted Answer

System owner/user discovery. Enumerating network shares and identifying current user context are discovery actions.

Answer

Data exfiltration

Answer

Process injection

Answer

System reboot