CCOA Practice Test 6 — 10 Questions

Question 1

A SOC analyst is investigating a suspected data exfiltration event on a Windows 10 endpoint. The analyst needs to enumerate all active network connections along with the owning process IDs to identify which process is communicating with an external IP. Which built-in Windows command should the analyst use?

Choose an answer to begin — your selection is scored in the full session.

Accepted Answer

netstat -ano. The netstat command with -ano flags provides a comprehensive view of all active TCP connections and listening ports, including the numeric addresses and the owning process identifier. This allows the analyst to correlate a suspicious external connection with a specific process, which is essential for determining whether the traffic is legitimate or indicative of exfiltration.

Answer

route print

Answer

nslookup -type=ANY

Answer

ipconfig /all

Question 2

A security operations center is establishing a baseline for privileged account management across its server estate. The team must reduce the risk that compromised administrative credentials lead to widespread lateral movement. Which TWO controls should the team implement to directly limit the blast radius of a compromised privileged account? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Enforce just-in-time elevation so administrative rights are granted only for the duration of an approved task. Blast radius is bounded by how much authority a stolen credential carries and for how long. Just-in-time elevation compresses the window in which administrative rights exist, and separating administrative accounts from daily-use identities prevents routine credential theft from yielding privilege. Password length, disk encryption, and antivirus all improve general security posture but none of them restrict what a valid privileged credential can reach once it is in an attacker's hands.

Answer

Increase the minimum password length for all accounts to 20 characters

Answer

Deploy a signature-based antivirus agent on every server

Answer

Enable full-disk encryption on all administrator workstations

Question 3

Which TWO of the following are considered 'Technical' controls?

Accepted Answer

Firewall configuration. Technical controls (logical controls) are implemented via software, hardware, or firmware.

Answer

Background checks

Answer

Security policy documentation

Answer

Guard patrol

Question 4

A healthcare organization's security operations team is mapping controls to the NIST Cybersecurity Framework. The CISO asks which function is primarily concerned with understanding the organization's assets, business environment, and risk appetite so that security activities can be prioritized. Which NIST CSF function should the analyst identify?

Accepted Answer

Identify. The Identify function establishes organizational understanding of assets, business environment, governance, and risk appetite, which is exactly what the CISO wants before prioritizing security activities. Protect, Detect, and Respond all depend on that foundational understanding and address safeguards, monitoring, or incident handling rather than asset and risk context.

Answer

Protect

Answer

Detect

Answer

Respond

Question 5

A security operations center (SOC) analyst is triaging a potential endpoint compromise. The EDR console shows a suspicious process created by a Microsoft Word document that spawned a child process of 'powershell.exe' with the arguments '-nop -w hidden -enc JABjAGwAaQBlAG4AdA...'. The parent process has since exited. Which detection technique would best confirm whether this activity represents a true positive?

Accepted Answer

Decoding the Base64 PowerShell argument and examining the resulting script for known malicious behaviors such as downloading a payload or establishing a reverse shell.. The encoded PowerShell command is the core artifact. Decoding it reveals the actual script, and if that script performs clearly malicious actions such as downloading a payload or creating a reverse shell, the activity is confirmed as a true positive. Other options provide supporting evidence but do not definitively prove malicious intent in this scenario.

Answer

Reviewing the Windows Security event log for Event ID 4688 to identify the full command line of the PowerShell process and its parent process ID.

Answer

Inspecting the Windows Registry for persistence mechanisms added by the PowerShell process, such as a Run key entry.

Answer

Checking the Microsoft Word document's file hash against VirusTotal to see if any antivirus engines flag it as malicious.

Question 6

During incident response for a suspected data exfiltration, the team captures full packet data at the perimeter. The CCOA analyst needs to determine whether large outbound transfers occurred over an encrypted channel that cannot be inspected. Which network flow artifact should the analyst use to identify the volume and duration of the transfers while preserving the ability to correlate with other logs?

Accepted Answer

NetFlow records exported from the perimeter router. Flow records provide the metadata needed to quantify outbound transfer volume and duration without decrypting payloads. They are lightweight, widely retained, and easily correlated with other telemetry, making them the right artifact for this encrypted-traffic scenario. Full packet capture is less efficient for volume analysis, while DNS and proxy logs address different aspects.

Answer

DNS query logs from the internal resolver

Answer

Full packet capture analyzed with a protocol analyzer

Answer

Proxy access logs with HTTP status codes

Question 7

A security operations center (SOC) analyst is triaging an alert indicating a potential phishing email that was delivered to several users. The analyst needs to determine if any user interacted with the malicious link. Which two data sources would be most directly useful for this determination? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Endpoint detection and response (EDR) telemetry. Web proxy logs and EDR telemetry both provide direct evidence of user interaction with a link. Proxy logs show the outbound request to the malicious URL, while EDR captures the browser process and network connection on the endpoint. Together, they can confirm if a user clicked the link. Other sources lack the necessary user or process context to make that determination.

Answer

Firewall logs

Answer

Domain Name System (DNS) logs

Answer

Email gateway logs

Question 8

During a risk assessment, an analyst determines that a legacy payroll application has a vulnerability that could allow remote code execution. The vendor no longer issues patches, and the application is required for monthly payroll runs. The CISO accepts the residual risk and documents the decision. Which risk treatment option has the organization chosen?

Accepted Answer

Risk acceptance. When an organization acknowledges a risk and formally decides to retain it after weighing treatment options, the chosen response is risk acceptance. Avoidance would require eliminating the payroll application, transfer would shift impact to a third party, and mitigation would add controls. The documented CISO decision confirms acceptance of residual risk.

Answer

Risk mitigation

Answer

Risk transfer

Answer

Risk avoidance

Question 9

A hospital's risk register lists ransomware against its electronic health record system with a likelihood of 'High' and an impact of 'Critical' on a five-point qualitative scale. The CISO must select a treatment option that reduces the residual risk to an acceptable level while preserving clinical availability. Which treatment approach BEST fits this scenario?

Accepted Answer

Mitigate the risk with layered controls such as immutable offline backups, network segmentation, and tested recovery procedures.. Because ransomware against clinical systems threatens both data and availability, the appropriate treatment is mitigation through layered preventive and recovery controls. Immutable offline backups remove the attacker's leverage, segmentation constrains spread, and tested recovery preserves patient care. Acceptance, pure transfer, and avoidance all fail to reduce the operational impact the hospital cannot tolerate.

Answer

Avoid the risk by disconnecting the electronic health record system from all external networks permanently.

Answer

Accept the risk because the electronic health record vendor contractually guarantees system uptime.

Answer

Transfer the risk entirely by purchasing a cyber insurance policy covering ransomware incidents.

Question 10

A security analyst is conducting a qualitative risk assessment for a new cloud-based customer relationship management (CRM) system. The team wants to prioritize risks without assigning monetary values. Which TWO factors are most relevant when using a qualitative risk matrix? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Impact or severity to business operations if the risk materializes. Qualitative risk matrices rank risks by combining likelihood and impact using descriptive scales. These two factors allow prioritization without monetary calculations. ALE, NPV, and ROSI are quantitative or financial metrics that require monetary inputs, so they fall outside the scope of a qualitative assessment focused on relative ranking.

Answer

Net present value (NPV) of the CRM investment

Answer

Return on security investment (ROSI) percentage

Answer

Annualized loss expectancy (ALE) in monetary terms