DEA-C01 Data Store Management Practice Question
A company is using Amazon DynamoDB to store session data for a web application. The data engineer needs to ensure that the data is encrypted at rest. Which action should the data engineer take?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often assume encryption at rest must be explicitly enabled or configured, when in fact DynamoDB enables it by default for all tables, leading them to incorrectly select client-side encryption or other unrelated options.
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
✓
Ensure encryption at rest is enabled on the DynamoDB table (default).
DynamoDB tables are encrypted at rest by default using AWS Key Management Service (KMS) with an AWS owned key. The data engineer does not need to take any additional action to enable encryption at rest, as it is automatically enabled for all new DynamoDB tables. This ensures that all data stored on disk, including the table's primary key, local secondary indexes, and global secondary indexes, is encrypted before being written to SSDs in AWS data centers.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Enable encryption at rest on the DynamoDB Accelerator (DAX) cluster.
Why it's wrong here
DAX is a cache, not the primary storage; encryption at rest is for the table.
- ✗
Use client-side encryption before writing to DynamoDB.
Why it's wrong here
Client-side encryption is an option but not necessary; server-side encryption is default.
- ✓
Ensure encryption at rest is enabled on the DynamoDB table (default).
Why this is correct
DynamoDB encrypts at rest by default using AWS KMS.
- ✗
Enable DynamoDB Time to Live (TTL) to encrypt data.
Why it's wrong here
TTL is for automatic deletion, not encryption.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DEA-C01 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 DEA-C01 exam.