PCNSA Timed Practice Test 3 — 10 Questions

Question 1

Which TWO actions can be taken in a security policy rule to allow traffic from the corporate network to the internet while also logging the traffic?

Accepted Answer

Set the rule action to 'allow'.. Option B is correct because setting the rule action to 'allow' permits the traffic from the corporate network to the internet, which is the primary requirement. To also log the traffic, you must enable logging; 'Log at Session End' (Option E) is the standard method to capture session details after the connection completes. Together, these two settings achieve both allowing and logging the traffic.

Answer

Set the rule action to 'reset-both'.

Answer

Set the rule action to 'deny'.

Answer

Enable 'Log at Session Start' in the rule.

Question 2

A security team notices that traffic from a specific internal subnet is not being inspected by the firewall. They have configured a security policy rule that matches the subnet and allows the traffic, but the traffic is still not being logged or inspected. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The rule is disabled in the rulebase.. Option D is correct because if a security policy rule is disabled in the rulebase, it will not be evaluated or enforced, even if it matches the traffic. The firewall will skip the rule entirely, meaning no logging or inspection occurs for traffic that would have matched it. This directly explains why the traffic is not being inspected or logged despite the rule appearing to be configured.

Answer

The rule is placed below an earlier rule that also matches the traffic.

Answer

The firewall's license for the threat prevention subscription has expired.

Answer

The firewall is in an active/passive HA pair and the passive unit is handling traffic.

Question 3

A firewall is configured with multiple security zones. Traffic from the 'Untrust' zone to the 'DMZ' zone is allowed for web services. The administrator wants to ensure that the DMZ servers cannot initiate connections to the Untrust zone. What is the correct approach?

Accepted Answer

Do nothing; by default, inter-zone traffic from DMZ to Untrust is blocked.. Option D is correct because, by default, Palo Alto Networks firewalls use an implicit deny rule for all inter-zone traffic that is not explicitly allowed. Since the administrator has only created a rule permitting traffic from Untrust to DMZ for web services, no rule exists to permit traffic from DMZ to Untrust, so the implicit deny blocks any DMZ-initiated connections to the Untrust zone without any additional configuration.

Answer

Configure a zone protection profile on the DMZ zone.

Answer

Create a rule allowing traffic from Untrust to DMZ and another rule allowing DMZ to Untrust.

Answer

Create a rule allowing traffic from DMZ to Untrust with a deny action.

Question 4

An organization is deploying a Palo Alto Networks firewall in a data center to segment traffic between three application tiers: web, app, and database. The web servers must be accessible from the internet, the app servers must only be reachable from the web servers, and the database servers must only be reachable from the app servers. Which security policy design best meets these requirements?

Accepted Answer

Create three zones: Web, App, DB. Create rules that allow only necessary protocols (e.g., HTTP/HTTPS from internet to Web, specific ports from Web to App, and specific ports from App to DB).. Option A is correct because it implements a least-privilege security model using Palo Alto Networks zones and granular application- and port-based rules. By creating separate zones (Web, App, DB) and explicitly allowing only the necessary protocols (e.g., HTTP/HTTPS from the internet to Web, specific ports from Web to App, and specific ports from App to DB), the firewall enforces strict segmentation and minimizes the attack surface. This design leverages the zone-based security paradigm of PAN-OS to control inter-zone traffic precisely, aligning with the principle of zero trust.

Answer

Create three zones: Web, App, DB. Allow all traffic from Web to App and App to DB, and block all other inter-zone traffic.

Answer

Place web servers in an untrust zone and app/database in a trust zone, then allow all traffic from trust to untrust.

Answer

Place all servers in the same zone and use rules to allow traffic between them.

Question 5

A network administrator is designing a Palo Alto Networks firewall deployment for a large enterprise with multiple branch offices. The requirement is to ensure that if the primary firewall at headquarters fails, the branch offices can still access the internet via a local breakout using a redundant firewall at the branch. Which architecture best meets this requirement with minimal complexity?

Accepted Answer

Deploy active/passive HA at headquarters and active/passive HA at each branch with local internet breakout. Option B is correct because deploying active/passive HA at each branch with local internet breakout ensures that if the primary firewall at headquarters fails, branch offices can still access the internet directly through their redundant firewall without relying on the hub. This design minimizes complexity by using simple HA pairs and local breakout policies, avoiding the need for complex routing or full mesh VPNs.

Answer

Use a hub-and-spoke VPN topology with headquarters as the hub

Answer

Use a full mesh VPN topology between all firewalls

Answer

Deploy active/active HA at headquarters and use IPsec VPN tunnels to each branch

Question 6

A company wants to ensure that all traffic from the internet to their internal web server is inspected for threats. Which configuration component is essential to achieve this?

Accepted Answer

A security policy rule that allows traffic from the internet zone to the DMZ zone and has a threat prevention profile attached.. Option C is correct because a security policy rule that allows traffic from the internet zone to the DMZ zone with a threat prevention profile attached is the essential component to inspect all traffic from the internet to the internal web server for threats. The threat prevention profile enables the firewall to perform intrusion prevention system (IPS) and antivirus inspection on the allowed traffic, ensuring malicious content is blocked. Without this profile, traffic would be permitted but not inspected for threats, failing the requirement.

Answer

Destination NAT policy to translate the public IP to the internal server.

Answer

SSL decryption policy to decrypt traffic to the web server.

Answer

A QoS policy to prioritize web traffic.

Question 7

Refer to the exhibit. A user from the trust zone (10.0.0.5) is trying to access a web server at 203.0.113.1 on port 80. The firewall shows a session with application 'incomplete'. What is the most likely reason for this?

Accepted Answer

The traffic is not matching the application 'web-browsing'. The session shows application 'incomplete' because the firewall has not yet identified the application due to insufficient data or because the traffic does not match the expected application signature. In this case, the traffic is likely not matching the 'web-browsing' application, which is the application defined in the security rule 'Allow-Web'. The firewall requires the first few packets to complete application identification; if the traffic is not recognized as 'web-browsing' (e.g., due to non-standard HTTP headers or encrypted payloads), the session remains 'incomplete' and may be dropped or not allowed by the rule.

Answer

The NAT rule is missing

Answer

The destination IP is not in the destination zone

Answer

The security rule 'Allow-Web' is configured after 'Block-All'

Question 8

During a security audit, an administrator notices that a security policy rule uses an address group that includes an FQDN object. The FQDN resolves to multiple IP addresses that change frequently. What is the best practice for ensuring the firewall uses the current resolved IPs without manual intervention?

Accepted Answer

Use an FQDN object in the address group; the firewall resolves it automatically. Option C is correct because Palo Alto Networks firewalls automatically resolve FQDN objects to their current IP addresses at runtime, without requiring manual updates. When an FQDN object is used in an address group, the firewall performs DNS resolution each time the policy is evaluated, ensuring that the latest IP addresses are used even if they change frequently.

Answer

Use a region object instead

Answer

Create a dynamic address group with a tag-based filter

Answer

Manually add all possible IP addresses to an address group

Question 9

A security administrator is troubleshooting a policy misconfiguration. The firewall is configured with a security rule that allows traffic from the 'Engineering' zone to the 'Servers' zone. However, traffic from an Engineering user to a server in the 'DMZ' zone is being denied. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The rule only allows traffic from Engineering to Servers zone, not DMZ.. The security rule explicitly permits traffic from the 'Engineering' zone to the 'Servers' zone. Traffic destined to the 'DMZ' zone is a different zone, so the rule does not apply. By default, Palo Alto Networks firewalls enforce a deny-all policy for any traffic that does not match an explicit allow rule, which is why the traffic is denied.

Answer

The rule is configured as an intrazone rule.

Answer

The rule is disabled in the rulebase.

Answer

SSL decryption is blocking the traffic.

Question 10

Which TWO actions should be taken to protect against DNS tunneling? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Enable DNS Security on the outbound DNS traffic.. Option A is correct because DNS Security (DNSsec) on Palo Alto Networks firewalls can inspect and block DNS tunneling by identifying anomalous DNS queries and responses, such as those with unusually long domain names or high query rates. This feature uses threat intelligence and machine learning to detect tunneling attempts without relying solely on static domain block lists.

Answer

Allow all TCP traffic on port 53.

Answer

Enable logging on all DNS traffic for analysis.

Answer

Block all UDP traffic on port 53.