DBS-C01 Management and Operations Practice Question
A database administrator needs to automate the backup process for an Amazon RDS for MySQL DB instance. The backups must be retained for 30 days and should be taken daily. Which AWS service should be used to implement this automation?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap here is that candidates may over-engineer the solution by choosing AWS Backup or Lambda, not realizing that RDS automated backups natively support daily backups with a configurable retention period up to 35 days, making them the simplest and most appropriate choice.
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
✓
Amazon RDS automated backups
Amazon RDS automated backups are the native, built-in mechanism for backing up RDS DB instances. They automatically take daily snapshots during the backup window and retain transaction logs for point-in-time recovery. By default, the retention period can be set from 1 to 35 days, so configuring it to 30 days meets the requirement without any additional services or custom scripting.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Amazon S3 lifecycle policies
Why it's wrong here
S3 lifecycle policies are for managing objects in S3, not for database backups.
- ✗
AWS Backup
Why it's wrong here
AWS Backup is tempting as it is a centralised backup service that supports Amazon RDS. However, for automating daily backups with a 30-day retention for an Amazon RDS for MySQL instance, the native automated backup feature of RDS itself directly provides this functionality. AWS Backup is primarily designed for consolidating backup policies across a diverse range of AWS services like EC2, EBS, EFS, and DynamoDB, or for managing cross-account/cross-region backup copies, rather than being the direct implementation mechanism for a single RDS instance's inherent automated backups.
- ✗
AWS Lambda with custom scripts
Why it's wrong here
While possible, it's unnecessary complexity when RDS automated backups provide the required functionality.
- ✓
Amazon RDS automated backups
Why this is correct
RDS automated backups can be enabled with a retention period of up to 35 days and perform daily backups automatically.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DBS-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 DBS-C01 exam.