SAA-C03 Design Secure Architectures Practice Question
A solutions architect is designing an S3 bucket for a claims portal. The objects must never be publicly accessible, even if a developer later adds an overly broad bucket policy. What should the architect configure? The design must avoid adding custom operational scripts.
⚠ Common exam trap
Many candidates think an IAM policy can block anonymous users, but IAM policies only apply to authenticated IAM principals, not to anonymous (unauthenticated) requests, making S3 Block Public Access the only effective solution.
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
✓
Enable S3 Block Public Access at the account or bucket level
S3 Block Public Access provides a definitive override that prevents any public access to S3 objects, even if a bucket policy or ACL later grants public access. This setting can be applied at the account or bucket level and ensures that all access is denied to anonymous users, meeting the requirement without custom scripts.
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 S3 Block Public Access at the account or bucket level
Why this is correct
Block Public Access applies an account- or bucket-level guardrail that overrides bucket policies and ACLs, so any later policy granting public access is refused. This enforces the never-publicly-accessible constraint declaratively, requiring no custom operational scripts.
- ✗
Create an IAM policy that denies s3:GetObject to anonymous users
Why it's wrong here
An IAM policy denying s3:GetObject to anonymous users does not override a bucket policy granting public access, because S3 evaluates bucket and identity policies together. Identity policies are correct for controlling specific principals, but Block Public Access is what prevents public exposure regardless of later policy edits.
- ✗
Enable server access logging on the bucket
Why it's wrong here
Server access logging only records requests made to the bucket; it neither evaluates nor blocks permissions, so an overly broad policy would still expose objects. Logging is correct when auditing access patterns or meeting compliance evidence requirements, not for enforcing public-access prevention.
- ✗
Enable S3 Transfer Acceleration
Why it's wrong here
Transfer Acceleration speeds uploads over AWS edge locations; it cannot block public access. The tempting fit is performance tuning for geographically dispersed uploads. Blocking public access despite broad policies requires S3 Block Public Access, which overrides bucket policies.
Visual reference
Quick reference
AWS S3 Storage Class Comparison
| Storage Class | Min Duration | Retrieval | Use Case |
|---|---|---|---|
| S3 Standard | None | Immediate | Frequently accessed data |
| S3 Standard-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Infrequent access, rapid retrieval |
| S3 One Zone-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Non-critical infrequent data |
| S3 Intelligent-Tiering | None | Immediate–hours | Unknown or changing access patterns |
| S3 Glacier Instant | 90 days | Milliseconds | Archive with instant retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Flexible | 90 days | Minutes–hours | Archive, flexible retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Deep Archive | 180 days | Hours | Long-term compliance archive |
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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.