SAP-C02 Design for New Solutions Practice Question
A company is designing a serverless application using AWS Lambda. The function needs to access a VPC resource. What is the correct way to configure this?
⚠ Common exam trap
It's easy for candidates to confuse external connectivity (Internet Gateway, NAT Gateway) with internal VPC access, mistakenly thinking those components are required for a Lambda function to reach resources within the same VPC.
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
✓
Assign the Lambda function to the VPC and configure a security group
Lambda functions must be attached to a VPC and assigned a security group to access resources within the VPC, such as an RDS database or an Elasticache cluster. This configuration creates an elastic network interface (ENI) in the VPC, allowing the function to communicate with VPC resources via private IP addresses. The security group acts as a virtual firewall to control inbound and outbound traffic for the Lambda function.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Attach an Internet Gateway to the VPC
Why it's wrong here
An Internet Gateway enables inbound and outbound internet traffic for a VPC, which is irrelevant to reaching an internal VPC resource. It is tempting because Lambda needs network pathing, but the function must instead be attached to private subnets within the VPC.
- ✓
Assign the Lambda function to the VPC and configure a security group
Why this is correct
Attaching the function to the VPC places its elastic network interfaces in specified subnets, and the security group controls outbound and inbound traffic to the VPC resource. This satisfies the requirement to reach a private VPC resource.
- ✗
Set up a VPC peering connection
Why it's wrong here
VPC peering connects two VPCs to each other, so it cannot place a Lambda function inside the VPC containing the resource. It is tempting because peering links networks, but the function must be configured with VPC subnet and security group settings.
- ✗
Configure a NAT Gateway in the public subnet
Why it's wrong here
A NAT Gateway provides outbound internet access for private subnets; it does not give Lambda access to a VPC resource. It is tempting because Lambda needs subnet routing, but the requirement is attaching the function to private subnets with appropriate security groups.
Quick reference
Cloud Service Model Comparison
| Model | You Manage | Provider Manages | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| IaaS | OS, runtime, apps, data | Hardware, hypervisor, networking | EC2, Azure VMs, GCP Compute Engine |
| PaaS | Apps and data | OS, runtime, middleware, hardware | Elastic Beanstalk, Azure App Service |
| SaaS | Data and settings only | Everything else | Microsoft 365, Salesforce, Workday |
| FaaS / Serverless | Function code only | Infra, scaling, runtime | Lambda, Azure Functions, Cloud Run |
| CaaS | Containers and apps | Kubernetes, OS, hardware | EKS, AKS, GKE |
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
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