Quick Answer
Amazon GuardDuty is the correct choice because it is a purpose-built threat detection service that continuously monitors AWS accounts and workloads for malicious activity and unauthorized behavior, leveraging integrated threat intelligence from sources like AWS Security Hub and third-party feeds. Unlike AWS Inspector, which focuses on vulnerability scanning, or AWS Config, which tracks resource configuration changes, GuardDuty analyzes VPC Flow Logs, DNS logs, and CloudTrail events to identify known attack patterns and anomalies. On the AWS Certified DevOps Engineer Professional DOP-C02 exam, this question tests your ability to distinguish between monitoring services—a common trap is confusing GuardDuty’s proactive threat detection with CloudWatch’s metric-based alerting, which lacks built-in threat intelligence. Remember that GuardDuty is the “guard dog” for your account: it barks at suspicious activity using curated threat feeds, while other services only watch the gate. A helpful memory tip is to think “GuardDuty = Guard + Duty” — it guards your duty of securing the account by detecting threats automatically.
This DOP-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 wants to automatically detect and respond to suspicious activity in their AWS account. Which service should be used to generate alerts based on threat intelligence?
Amazon GuardDuty
GuardDuty uses threat intelligence to detect suspicious activity.
AWS Config
Why wrong: Config evaluates compliance of resource configurations.
Amazon Inspector
Why wrong: Inspector scans for vulnerabilities, not threat detection.
Amazon CloudWatch
Why wrong: CloudWatch monitors metrics and logs; it can be used with custom rules but does not provide built-in threat intelligence.
Answer choices
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
Amazon GuardDuty
Amazon GuardDuty is a threat detection service that continuously monitors for malicious activity and unauthorized behavior using threat intelligence. Inspector is for vulnerability scanning. Config is for resource configuration. CloudWatch is for monitoring metrics and logs but does not have built-in threat intelligence.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
Amazon GuardDuty
Why this is correct
GuardDuty uses threat intelligence to detect suspicious activity.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
AWS Config
Why it's wrong here
Config evaluates compliance of resource configurations.
Amazon Inspector
Why it's wrong here
Inspector scans for vulnerabilities, not threat detection.
Amazon CloudWatch
Why it's wrong here
CloudWatch monitors metrics and logs; it can be used with custom rules but does not provide built-in threat intelligence.
Common exam traps
Many certification questions include familiar terms but test a specific constraint. Read the exact wording before choosing an answer that is generally true but wrong for this case.
Detailed technical explanation
This question should be treated as a scenario, not a definition check. Identify the problem, the constraint and the best action. Then compare each option against those facts.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
A cloud solutions architect for a retail company is evaluating services for a new workload. The correct answer here reflects best practice for the specific scenario described — not a general cloud recommendation. Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option. Cloud exam questions reward reading the constraint carefully: the same technology can be right or wrong depending on the use case.
What to study next
Identify which DOP-C02 exam domain this question belongs to, then review the specific concept being tested. Practise related questions in that domain and focus on understanding why each wrong answer is tempting — not just why the correct answer is right.
Security and Compliance — study guide chapter
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FAQ
Security and Compliance — This question tests Security and Compliance — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
The correct answer is: Amazon GuardDuty — Amazon GuardDuty is a threat detection service that continuously monitors for malicious activity and unauthorized behavior using threat intelligence. Inspector is for vulnerability scanning. Config is for resource configuration. CloudWatch is for monitoring metrics and logs but does not have built-in threat intelligence.
Identify which DOP-C02 exam domain this question belongs to, then review the specific concept being tested. Practise related questions in that domain and focus on understanding why each wrong answer is tempting — not just why the correct answer is right.
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
About these practice questions
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Last reviewed: Jun 20, 2026
This DOP-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 DOP-C02 exam.
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