SOA-C02 Reliability and Business Continuity Practice Question
A company stores critical data in an S3 bucket. The SysOps administrator needs to ensure that the data is durable and can be recovered if an entire AWS Region becomes unavailable. What is the MOST cost-effective solution?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often confuse S3 Versioning (which protects against accidental deletion within a Region) with Cross-Region Replication (which protects against Regional outages), leading them to select Option B as a cheaper alternative without understanding that versioning does not provide geographic redundancy.
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
✓
Configure S3 Cross-Region Replication to a bucket in another Region.
D is correct because S3 Cross-Region Replication (CRR) automatically replicates objects to a bucket in another AWS Region, ensuring data durability and recoverability even if an entire Region becomes unavailable. This is the most cost-effective solution for cross-region disaster recovery as it only incurs replication costs and storage fees in the destination Region, without requiring manual intervention or additional infrastructure.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Use AWS Backup to manually copy the bucket to another Region.
Why it's wrong here
AWS Backup can automate backups, but CRR is the native S3 feature for continuous replication.
- ✗
Enable S3 Versioning on the bucket.
Why it's wrong here
Versioning protects against accidental deletion but not regional failure.
- ✗
Use S3 Standard storage class.
Why it's wrong here
S3 Standard is highly durable but within a single Region; does not protect against Region failure.
- ✓
Configure S3 Cross-Region Replication to a bucket in another Region.
Why this is correct
CRR replicates data to another Region for disaster recovery.
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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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This SOA-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 SOA-C02 exam.