SC-900 Practice Test 34 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A company uses Microsoft 365 and Azure. They want a unified security solution that provides threat protection across email, endpoints, identities, and cloud apps, with automated investigation and response capabilities. Which Microsoft solution should they use?

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

Accepted Answer

Microsoft 365 Defender. Microsoft 365 Defender is a unified pre- and post-breach enterprise defense suite that coordinates detection, prevention, investigation, and response across email, endpoints, identities, and cloud apps. It provides automated investigation and response (AIR) capabilities through its integrated components (e.g., Defender for Endpoint, Defender for Office 365, Defender for Identity, and Defender for Cloud Apps), making it the correct choice for the described requirements.

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Microsoft Defender for Cloud

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Microsoft Sentinel

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Microsoft Entra ID Protection

Question 2

A company's IT department implements a policy for server administrators: they must submit an access request to perform privileged tasks on critical servers. Each request is approved by a manager, and the granted elevated permissions automatically expire after four hours. This approach reduces the risk of standing privileges being exploited. Which security concept is primarily being applied?

Accepted Answer

Just-in-time access. Just-in-time (JIT) access is a security concept that grants elevated permissions only when needed, for a limited duration, and requires approval. In this scenario, the policy requires an access request, manager approval, and automatic expiration after four hours, which directly aligns with JIT access to reduce the risk of standing privileges being exploited.

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Least privilege

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Defense in depth

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Zero Trust

Question 3

A company implements a security model where no user or device is automatically trusted, even if they are inside the corporate network. Every access request must be authenticated, authorized, and encrypted before granting access, regardless of the request origin. This model is known as:

Accepted Answer

Zero Trust. Zero Trust is a security model that explicitly assumes no implicit trust based on network location. Every access request must be authenticated, authorized, and encrypted, regardless of whether it originates from inside or outside the corporate network. This aligns with the core Zero Trust principle of 'never trust, always verify'.

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Defense in depth

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Perimeter security

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Least privilege

Question 4

A security team is evaluating Microsoft security solutions to monitor user activities across multiple SaaS applications, including Salesforce and Dropbox, for signs of compromised accounts and data exfiltration. Which solution is specifically designed for this purpose?

Accepted Answer

Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is a Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) that provides deep visibility, data classification, and threat detection across SaaS applications like Salesforce and Dropbox. It uses behavioral analytics and anomaly detection to identify compromised accounts and data exfiltration by monitoring user activities and applying policies such as activity policies and app governance.

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Microsoft Defender for Endpoint

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Microsoft Sentinel

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Microsoft 365 Defender

Question 5

A company assigns permissions to users based strictly on their job title (e.g., Sales Manager can edit documents, Sales User can only read). Which identity and access management concept is being implemented?

Accepted Answer

Role-Based Access Control (RBAC). Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) is the correct concept because it assigns permissions to users based on their job title or role within the organization. In this scenario, the Sales Manager role is granted edit permissions, while the Sales User role is restricted to read-only, which is a direct implementation of RBAC where access rights are tied to roles rather than individual users.

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Least privilege

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Defense in depth

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Zero Trust

Question 6

A security administrator is explaining the concept of defense in depth to a new team member. Which statement best describes this approach?

Accepted Answer

Layering multiple security controls across different areas of the IT environment. Defense in depth is a cybersecurity strategy that employs multiple layers of security controls across different areas of the IT environment (network, endpoint, application, data, and physical). This approach ensures that if one control fails, another is already in place to mitigate the threat, providing redundancy and reducing the risk of a single point of failure. Microsoft's security framework, including tools like Microsoft Defender for Cloud and Azure Firewall, operationalizes this concept by integrating protections at each layer.

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Using a single, strong firewall to block all external traffic

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Relying solely on encryption to protect all data at rest and in transit

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Implementing only physical security measures to protect the data center

Question 7

A company configures its identity and access management system so that employees are granted only the permissions necessary to perform their job functions. For example, a sales representative has read-only access to the customer database and cannot modify financial records. Which security principle is being applied in this scenario?

Accepted Answer

Least privilege. The scenario describes granting employees only the permissions necessary to perform their job functions, which is the core definition of the least privilege principle. In Microsoft identity and access management, this is implemented by assigning the minimum required Azure RBAC roles or Microsoft Entra ID directory roles, ensuring users have no more access than needed. This directly reduces the attack surface and limits potential damage from compromised accounts.

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Segregation of duties

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Defense in depth

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Zero Trust

Question 8

A company uses Microsoft Entra ID. They have a financial application that should only be accessible from Windows devices. The security team wants to create a Conditional Access policy to block access from other operating systems such as macOS or Linux. Which assignment condition should they configure?

Accepted Answer

Device platforms. The Device platforms condition in a Conditional Access policy allows administrators to target specific operating systems (e.g., Windows, iOS, Android, macOS) or block others. By configuring this condition to only include Windows devices, the policy will block access from macOS, Linux, or any other non-Windows platform. This directly addresses the security team's requirement to restrict the financial application to Windows devices only.

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Locations

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Client apps

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Sign-in risk

Question 9

A company uses Microsoft Entra ID (Microsoft Entra ID) and wants to configure self-service password reset (SSPR) for all users. The security team requires that users must verify their identity with at least two methods before resetting a password. Which SSPR setting should be configured?

Accepted Answer

Number of methods required to reset: 2. Self-Service Password Reset (SSPR) in Microsoft Entra ID allows administrators to set the number of authentication methods required to reset a password. By setting 'Number of methods required to reset' to 2, users must provide two verification methods (e.g., email and phone) to confirm their identity.

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Require re-registration on every authentication

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Enable combined registration for SSPR and MFA

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Set password expiration to 0 days

Question 10

A healthcare company stores patient records in an Azure SQL database. To protect the data, they enable Transparent Data Encryption (TDE) for the database and require all client connections to use TLS. Which security goal is being primarily addressed by these measures?

Accepted Answer

Confidentiality. Transparent Data Encryption (TDE) encrypts data at rest in the Azure SQL database, ensuring that even if the physical storage media is compromised, the data remains unreadable. Requiring TLS for client connections encrypts data in transit, preventing eavesdropping or interception. Both measures directly protect the confidentiality of patient records by preventing unauthorized access to the data.

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Integrity

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Availability

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Non-repudiation

Question 11

A security team needs to collect and analyze security logs from a hybrid environment consisting of on-premises Windows servers, Azure virtual machines, and AWS workloads. They want to correlate events, detect anomalous behavior, and create custom security alerts with automated response playbooks. Which Microsoft security solution should they use?

Accepted Answer

Microsoft Sentinel. Microsoft Sentinel is the correct solution because it is a cloud-native SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) and SOAR (Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response) solution designed to ingest logs from hybrid and multi-cloud environments, including on-premises Windows servers, Azure VMs, and AWS workloads. It provides advanced correlation of events across these sources, built-in anomaly detection using machine learning, and the ability to create custom security alerts and automated response playbooks via Azure Logic Apps. This directly matches the requirement for collecting, analyzing, correlating, detecting anomalies, and automating responses.

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Microsoft Defender for Cloud

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Microsoft Defender for Office 365

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Microsoft Defender for Identity

Question 12

A company implements a policy where each employee is granted only the permissions necessary to perform their specific job role. For example, a marketing specialist has read-only access to the customer database and cannot modify financial records. Which security principle is primarily being applied?

Accepted Answer

Least privilege. The principle of least privilege dictates that users should be granted only the permissions necessary to perform their job functions. In this scenario, the marketing specialist receives read-only access to the customer database and no access to financial records, which directly aligns with limiting permissions to the minimum required. This reduces the attack surface and limits potential damage from accidental or malicious actions.

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Defense in depth

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Zero Trust

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Separation of duties

Question 13

A security team wants to discover all cloud applications being used by employees, including unsanctioned file sharing and collaboration apps. They plan to analyze traffic logs from their network firewall to identify usage patterns and assess each app's risk level. Which feature of Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps should they enable?

Accepted Answer

Cloud Discovery. Cloud Discovery is the correct feature because it analyzes traffic logs from network firewalls and proxies to identify all cloud applications in use, including unsanctioned ones. It uses the Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps catalog to assess each app's risk level based on factors like security posture, compliance certifications, and industry standards. This directly matches the scenario of discovering unsanctioned file sharing and collaboration apps from firewall logs.

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App Connectors

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Conditional Access App Control

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Information Protection

Question 14

A consulting firm is involved in a legal investigation. They need to preserve all emails and documents from two specific employees (custodians) related to a contract dispute. The data must be collected and stored in a secure location for legal review without modifying the original data. Which Microsoft Purview solution should they use?

Accepted Answer

eDiscovery (Premium). eDiscovery (Premium) is the correct solution because it is specifically designed for legal investigations, allowing you to identify, preserve, collect, and analyze data from custodians (e.g., employees) without altering the original data. It places a legal hold on mailboxes and sites, ensuring that emails and documents related to the contract dispute are stored in a secure review location for legal review, meeting the requirement of non-modification.

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Data Lifecycle Management

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Audit (Premium)

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Communication Compliance

Question 15

A user logs into a company's application using their username and password. After logging in, the application checks whether the user belongs to the 'Admin' role before granting access to the user management page. Which security concept is primarily illustrated by the role check?

Accepted Answer

Authorization. The role check after login determines what actions the authenticated user is allowed to perform, specifically whether they can access the user management page. This is the essence of authorization, which controls access to resources based on identity and assigned permissions. In Microsoft identity and access management, authorization is enforced via role-based access control (RBAC), where the application verifies the user's role claim (e.g., 'Admin') in the access token.

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Authentication

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Accounting

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Non-repudiation