A company runs a stateless web application on a single Amazon EC2 instance in the us-east-1a Availability Zone. The application stores session data in an external Amazon ElastiCache cluster. Due to a power failure in the data center hosting us-east-1a, the EC2 instance becomes unavailable. The company wants to redesign the architecture so that the application recovers automatically in minutes if a single Availability Zone fails. Which design principle should the company implement?
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Good practice is not just finding the correct option. The wrong answers often show the exact trap the exam wants you to fall into.
Distractor review
Deploy the application across multiple AWS Regions and use Amazon Route 53 latency-based routing to failover.
This option addresses region-level failures, which is overkill and more expensive for a failure that is confined to a single Availability Zone. It also adds latency and complexity that are unnecessary for this scenario.
Best answer
Place the EC2 instance in an Auto Scaling group with a minimum capacity of 1, and configure the Auto Scaling group to span multiple Availability Zones.
This is correct because an Auto Scaling group that spans multiple Availability Zones will automatically replace a failed instance in a healthy Availability Zone, ensuring the application remains available even if one AZ goes down.
Distractor review
Use a larger EC2 instance type with dedicated tenancy to reduce the risk of hardware failure.
A larger instance type or dedicated tenancy does not protect against an Availability Zone failure. It only changes the instance's capacity or isolation, not its dependence on a single AZ.
Distractor review
Enable termination protection on the EC2 instance to prevent accidental stopping.
Termination protection only prevents an instance from being terminated through the AWS console or API. It does not help if the instance becomes unavailable due to an underlying power or infrastructure failure in the Availability Zone.
Common exam trap
Common exam trap: NAT rules depend on direction and matching traffic
NAT is not only about the public address. The inside/outside interface roles and the ACL or rule that matches traffic are just as important.
Technical deep dive
How to think about this question
NAT questions usually test address translation, overload/PAT behaviour, static mappings and whether the right traffic is being translated. Read the interface direction and address terms carefully.
KKey Concepts to Remember
- Static NAT maps one inside address to one outside address.
- PAT allows many inside hosts to share one public address using ports.
- Inside local and inside global describe the private and translated addresses.
- NAT ACLs identify traffic for translation, not always security filtering.
TExam Day Tips
- Identify inside and outside interfaces first.
- Check whether the scenario needs static NAT, dynamic NAT or PAT.
- Do not confuse NAT matching ACLs with normal packet-filtering intent.
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More questions from this exam
Keep practising from the same exam bank, or move into a focused topic page if this question exposed a weak area.
Question 1
A developer needs to launch a test server for a new application prototype. The developer logs into the AWS Management Console, selects an Amazon EC2 instance type, configures the security group, and starts the instance. The instance is running within two minutes, and the developer did not need to submit a formal request to the company's IT procurement team or wait for approval from a cloud administrator. Which essential characteristic of cloud computing does this scenario best demonstrate?
Question 2
A solutions architect is planning a new web application on AWS. The workload will include 3 Amazon EC2 instances (t3.medium) running 24/7, an Application Load Balancer, and an Amazon RDS for MySQL db.t3.small database. The architect needs to estimate the monthly cost for the first year, considering different purchasing options (On-Demand, 1-year All Upfront Reserved Instance, and Compute Savings Plan). Which AWS tool should the architect use to create this estimate?
Question 3
A company's development team frequently needs temporary test environments. A developer can log into the AWS Management Console, select an Amazon EC2 instance type, configure storage, and launch the instance within minutes without any interaction with the IT infrastructure team. This capability is an example of which essential characteristic of cloud computing?
Question 4
A company's finance team needs to analyze AWS spending in detail. They require a report that includes hourly cost data for each AWS service, each individual resource (e.g., a specific EC2 instance), and any cost allocation tags applied. The team plans to export this data to an Amazon S3 bucket and then import it into a custom business intelligence (BI) analytics dashboard. Which AWS tool should the finance team use to generate this level of detailed cost data?
Question 5
A company uses AWS for its development environment. The finance team wants to set a monthly budget of $10,000. They want to receive an email notification when the actual costs reach 80% of the budget ($8,000) and again when costs exceed the budget. The team needs a managed AWS service that can automatically send these alerts without requiring custom code or third-party tools. Which AWS service should the team use?
Question 6
A company uses AWS Organizations to manage multiple accounts. The security team needs to enforce a policy that restricts SSH access (port 22) from the internet (0.0.0.0/0) in all VPCs across all accounts. The team wants to centrally define the allowed rules and automatically apply them to newly created VPCs and security groups, while also automatically remediating any existing non-compliant security groups. Which AWS service should the team use?
FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this CLF-C02 question test?
Static NAT maps one inside address to one outside address.
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Place the EC2 instance in an Auto Scaling group with a minimum capacity of 1, and configure the Auto Scaling group to span multiple Availability Zones. — The correct answer is to deploy the application across multiple Availability Zones using an Auto Scaling group. This ensures that if one Availability Zone fails, the Auto Scaling group automatically launches a new instance in a healthy Availability Zone, providing high availability and automatic recovery. Deploying across multiple AWS Regions (option A) is designed for region-level failures and introduces unnecessary complexity and cost for a failure that is limited to a single Availability Zone. Using a larger instance type (option C) does not protect against an Availability Zone failure; it only provides more capacity. Enabling termination protection (option D) prevents accidental termination but does not help with the spontaneous failure of the underlying hardware or data center.
What should I do if I get this CLF-C02 question wrong?
Then try more questions from the same exam bank and focus on understanding why the wrong options are tempting.
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