PAS-C01 Operations and Maintenance Practice Question
A company is using AWS Systems Manager to automate patching of SAP EC2 instances. The patching fails for some instances with the error 'Unable to retrieve SSM Agent registration'. What is the MOST likely cause?
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
✓
The instance does not have outbound internet access or a VPC endpoint for Systems Manager.
The error 'Unable to retrieve SSM Agent registration' indicates that the SSM Agent cannot communicate with the Systems Manager service. This typically occurs when the instance lacks outbound internet access or a VPC endpoint for Systems Manager. Option A is incorrect because a patching window timeout would produce a different error. Option B is incorrect because the IAM role permissions issue would cause an access denied error, not a registration failure. Option D is incorrect because the SSM Agent runs on EC2 instances, not containers, and the error is unrelated to container environments.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
The patching window is too short and the instance times out.
Why it's wrong here
The error is about registration, not timeout.
- ✗
The IAM role attached to the instance does not have permissions to list patches.
Why it's wrong here
The error indicates registration failure, not permission to list patches.
- ✓
The instance does not have outbound internet access or a VPC endpoint for Systems Manager.
Why this is correct
SSM requires connectivity to Systems Manager endpoints.
- ✗
The SSM Agent is not installed because the instance is running in a container.
Why it's wrong here
SSM Agent runs on EC2 instances, not containers.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This PAS-C01 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 PAS-C01 exam.