PAS-C01 Amazon CloudWatch Logs Practice Question
A company runs SAP on AWS and needs to ensure that the SAP application logs are centrally collected and analyzed for security incidents. Which AWS service should be used to collect and store the logs from EC2 instances?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often choose CloudTrail because it logs API calls, but it does not capture application-level logs. CloudWatch Logs is the correct service for collecting custom application logs from EC2 instances.
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
✓
Amazon CloudWatch Logs
Amazon CloudWatch Logs can collect and store application logs from EC2 instances using the unified CloudWatch agent. It provides centralized log management and can be used for security incident analysis. Option A (Amazon Kinesis Data Firehose) is for streaming data to destinations like S3 or Redshift, not primarily for log collection from instances. Option B (AWS CloudTrail) records API activity, not application logs. Option C (Amazon S3) can store logs but does not directly collect them from EC2 instances without additional services like CloudWatch Logs or Kinesis. Therefore, Amazon CloudWatch Logs is the correct service for collecting and storing SAP application logs from EC2 instances.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Amazon Kinesis Data Firehose
Why it's wrong here
Kinesis is for streaming data, not direct log collection from EC2.
- ✗
AWS CloudTrail
Why it's wrong here
CloudTrail records API calls, not application logs.
- ✗
Amazon S3
Why it's wrong here
S3 is a storage service but does not collect logs from instances directly.
- ✓
Amazon CloudWatch Logs
Why this is correct
CloudWatch Logs can collect and store application logs from EC2 instances.
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 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.