SAA-C03 AWS Systems Manager Session Manager Practice Question
A company hosts a B2B file exchange site on EC2. Administrators must connect without opening SSH or RDP ports to the internet. What should the architect use? The design must avoid adding custom operational scripts.
⚠ Common exam trap
Test-takers frequently assume a bastion host is the only secure way to access private instances, but AWS Systems Manager Session Manager provides a fully managed, agent-based alternative that avoids opening any inbound ports and requires no custom scripts.
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 Systems Manager Session Manager with the required instance role
AWS Systems Manager Session Manager allows administrators to establish secure shell access to EC2 instances without opening inbound SSH or RDP ports, using the Systems Manager agent and an IAM instance role. This meets the requirement for no internet-exposed ports and avoids custom operational scripts because Session Manager is a fully managed AWS service.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
A bastion host with SSH open to 0.0.0.0/0
Why it's wrong here
Opening SSH broadly increases attack surface.
- ✓
AWS Systems Manager Session Manager with the required instance role
Why this is correct
Session Manager provides audited shell access without inbound SSH/RDP exposure.
- ✗
A public Elastic IP address on each instance
Why it's wrong here
Public IPs do not provide secure administrative access by themselves.
- ✗
An internet gateway attached to the private subnet
Why it's wrong here
Internet gateways do not make private administration secure.
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This SAA-C03 question is part of Courseiva's 302-question bank — original exam-style content with full explanations and wrong-answer analysis, never real exam questions or exam dumps. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This SAA-C03 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 SAA-C03 exam.