SCS-C02 Threat Detection and Incident Response Practice Question
A security engineer needs to detect and respond to suspicious activity on an Amazon RDS database. Which TWO services can be used together to monitor database activity and trigger automated remediation?
⚠ Common exam trap
Watch out — candidates often confuse monitoring services (Enhanced Monitoring, Performance Insights) with security detection and response services, or they overlook that GuardDuty alone cannot perform automated remediation—it requires a compute service like Lambda to execute the response actions.
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
✓
AWS Lambda
AWS Lambda is correct because it can be triggered by Amazon RDS database activity streams (e.g., via Amazon RDS for MySQL or PostgreSQL) or by Amazon CloudWatch Events/EventBridge rules that detect suspicious database events (such as failed login attempts or unusual query patterns). Lambda functions can then execute automated remediation actions, such as revoking database access, rotating credentials, or isolating the database instance. This enables a serverless, event-driven response to threats without manual intervention.
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 Detective
Why it's wrong here
Amazon Detective is a post-incident investigation service that ingests existing findings from GuardDuty and other sources to help analyze root cause and visualize attack paths. It does not actively detect threats in real time nor execute any remediation actions, so it cannot fulfill the 'detect and respond' requirement without an automation engine like Lambda.
- ✗
Amazon RDS Enhanced Monitoring
Why it's wrong here
Amazon RDS Enhanced Monitoring provides operating system-level metrics for RDS instances, such as CPU, memory, and disk I/O utilization. It is designed for performance troubleshooting and capacity planning, not for examining database queries, user logins, or security events. Thus it cannot detect suspicious activity such as anomalous authentication patterns or SQL injection attempts.
- ✓
AWS Lambda
Why this is correct
AWS Lambda is the correct answer because it is a serverless compute service that can be triggered by security events via Amazon EventBridge (e.g., a GuardDuty finding) and execute automated response actions. A Lambda function can revoke IAM credentials, modify security groups, terminate instances, or quarantine an RDS instance, turning detection signals into immediate remediation without manual intervention.
- ✗
Amazon RDS Performance Insights
Why it's wrong here
Amazon RDS Performance Insights is a database performance tuning feature that visualizes database load, wait events, and top SQL queries. Its purpose is to help identify performance bottlenecks like slow queries or resource contention, not to monitor for security threats such as unauthorized access or suspicious query patterns. Therefore it is irrelevant to the security detection and response use case.
- ✓
Amazon GuardDuty
Why this is correct
Amazon GuardDuty is a security monitoring service that uses machine learning and integrated threat intelligence to detect suspicious activity, including unusual RDS login patterns, API calls from known malicious IPs, and other anomalies. It generates findings but does not automatically remediate them; instead, it emits events to EventBridge, which can trigger AWS Lambda to perform the response. GuardDuty satisfies the detection side, while Lambda provides the response automation.
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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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This SCS-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 SCS-C02 exam.