SAP-C02 Continuous Improvement for Existing Solutions Practice Question
A company is using AWS CloudFormation to deploy infrastructure. The security team requires that all Amazon S3 buckets created by CloudFormation must be encrypted at rest. What should a solutions architect do to enforce this requirement?
⚠ Common exam trap
It's easy for candidates to confuse default encryption (which passively encrypts objects but does not enforce encryption) with a bucket policy that actively denies unencrypted uploads, leading them to choose Option A instead of the correct enforcement mechanism.
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
✓
Add an S3 bucket policy that denies s3:PutObject without the x-amz-server-side-encryption header.
An S3 bucket policy that denies s3:PutObject unless the request includes the x-amz-server-side-encryption header enforces encryption at rest for all objects uploaded to the bucket. This policy condition works regardless of how the bucket is created, including via CloudFormation, and ensures that any PutObject operation without the required encryption header is rejected, meeting the security team's requirement.
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 default encryption on each bucket using SSE-S3.
Why it's wrong here
Default encryption only applies to objects uploaded without encryption headers; it can be overridden.
- ✓
Add an S3 bucket policy that denies s3:PutObject without the x-amz-server-side-encryption header.
Why this is correct
The bucket policy rejects unencrypted uploads.
- ✗
Require that all buckets use AWS KMS managed keys for encryption.
Why it's wrong here
This does not enforce encryption at upload time.
- ✗
Use a CloudFormation stack policy to prevent modification of bucket encryption settings.
Why it's wrong here
Stack policies protect resources from updates, not from unencrypted uploads.
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 |
Go deeper
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This SAP-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 SAP-C02 exam.