- A
AWS Trusted Advisor
Why wrong: AWS Trusted Advisor provides recommendations based on AWS best practices, but it does not support custom rules to evaluate resource configurations against company-specific policies. It cannot check for specific tags or security group associations.
- B
Amazon GuardDuty
Why wrong: Amazon GuardDuty is a threat detection service that uses machine learning to identify suspicious activity, such as unusual API calls or compromised credentials. It does not evaluate resource configurations for compliance with tagging or security group rules.
- C
AWS Config
AWS Config allows you to define rules (both managed and custom) that evaluate the configuration of your AWS resources. It continuously monitors for changes and can automatically detect resources that violate your policies, such as missing tags or incorrect security groups, and send notifications through Amazon SNS.
- D
Amazon Inspector
Why wrong: Amazon Inspector is a vulnerability management service that scans workloads for software vulnerabilities and unintended network exposure. It does not check resource metadata like tags or security group associations for compliance.
CLF-C02 Security and Compliance Practice Question
This CLF-C02 practice question tests your understanding of security and compliance. This is a configuration task: choose the command set that satisfies every stated requirement. Small differences — like 'secret' vs 'password' or 'transport input ssh' vs 'all' — change whether the answer is correct. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
A company has a compliance policy requiring that all Amazon EC2 instances in its production environment must have the tag "Environment=Production" and must be associated with a security group named "Prod-SG". The company wants to continuously monitor its AWS account and automatically detect any EC2 instances that do not meet these requirements. The IT team needs a service that can evaluate the configuration of resources against these rules and send notifications when a non-compliant resource is detected. Which AWS service should the company use?
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
AWS Config
AWS Config is the correct service because it provides continuous monitoring and evaluation of AWS resource configurations against desired rules. You can create a custom AWS Config rule to check that all EC2 instances have the tag 'Environment=Production' and are associated with the security group 'Prod-SG'. When a resource becomes non-compliant, AWS Config can trigger an Amazon SNS notification to alert the IT team.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
AWS Trusted Advisor
Why it's wrong here
AWS Trusted Advisor provides recommendations based on AWS best practices, but it does not support custom rules to evaluate resource configurations against company-specific policies. It cannot check for specific tags or security group associations.
- ✗
Amazon GuardDuty
Why it's wrong here
Amazon GuardDuty is a threat detection service that uses machine learning to identify suspicious activity, such as unusual API calls or compromised credentials. It does not evaluate resource configurations for compliance with tagging or security group rules.
- ✓
AWS Config
Why this is correct
AWS Config allows you to define rules (both managed and custom) that evaluate the configuration of your AWS resources. It continuously monitors for changes and can automatically detect resources that violate your policies, such as missing tags or incorrect security groups, and send notifications through Amazon SNS.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
- ✗
Amazon Inspector
Why it's wrong here
Amazon Inspector is a vulnerability management service that scans workloads for software vulnerabilities and unintended network exposure. It does not check resource metadata like tags or security group associations for compliance.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
The trap here is that candidates confuse AWS Config (configuration auditing and compliance) with AWS Trusted Advisor (best-practice recommendations) or Amazon GuardDuty (threat detection), but only AWS Config can evaluate custom rules like tag and security group requirements.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
AWS Config uses a managed or custom Lambda-backed rule to evaluate resource configurations. The evaluation is triggered by configuration changes or at a periodic interval, and the results are stored in a configuration timeline. For tag-based and security group checks, you would typically use a custom AWS Config rule with a Lambda function that queries the EC2 instance's tags and security group associations, then reports compliance status back to AWS Config.
KKey Concepts to Remember
- Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
- Find the constraint that changes the correct option.
- Eliminate answers that are true in general but not in this case.
TExam Day Tips
- Watch for words such as best, first, most likely and least administrative effort.
- Review why wrong options are wrong, not only why the correct option is correct.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
How this comes up in practice
A company's IT admin needs to give a contractor read-only access to production logs without sharing account credentials. Using role-based access control (RBAC) and temporary scoped permissions — not a permanent shared password — is the correct pattern. Questions like this test whether you can apply least-privilege access across cloud identity services.
What to study next
Got this wrong? Here's your next step.
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
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Security and Compliance — study guide chapter
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FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this CLF-C02 question test?
Security and Compliance — This question tests Security and Compliance — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: AWS Config — AWS Config is the correct service because it provides continuous monitoring and evaluation of AWS resource configurations against desired rules. You can create a custom AWS Config rule to check that all EC2 instances have the tag 'Environment=Production' and are associated with the security group 'Prod-SG'. When a resource becomes non-compliant, AWS Config can trigger an Amazon SNS notification to alert the IT team.
What should I do if I get this CLF-C02 question wrong?
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
About these practice questions
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Last reviewed: Jun 11, 2026
This CLF-C02 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the CLF-C02 exam.
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