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350-701 Practice Question: An engineer is troubleshooting traffic drops on a…
An engineer is troubleshooting traffic drops on a Cisco Firepower Threat Defense (FTD) device. The traffic is allowed by the access control policy but is being dropped. Which feature should the engineer check to identify the cause of the drop?
⚠ Common exam trap
Cisco often tests the misconception that 'show access-list hit counts' or 'show conn' can diagnose drops, but the trap here is that FTD has multiple inspection layers (prefilter, SSL, intrusion, file, etc.) beyond the basic access control policy, and only a packet trace can pinpoint which layer caused the drop.
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
✓
Use the 'capture' command with trace option to see packet flow and drop reason.
The 'capture' command with the 'trace' option on Cisco FTD provides a detailed, packet-level analysis of how traffic is processed through the firewall pipeline. It shows each step (e.g., ingress, routing, access control, NAT, egress) and explicitly states the drop reason, such as 'action-drop' due to intrusion prevention, URL filtering, or security intelligence, even when the access control policy appears to allow the traffic. This is the only option that directly identifies the specific cause of a drop in the data path.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Check the 'show access-list' output for the hit count.
Why it's wrong here
Shows if the ACL matches, but not where drops occur.
- ✗
Check the 'show route' output for routing issues.
Why it's wrong here
Routing issues may cause drops, but not the only cause.
- ✓
Use the 'capture' command with trace option to see packet flow and drop reason.
Why this is correct
Captures packets and shows the disposition, including drops.
- ✗
Check the 'show conn' output for the connection state.
Why it's wrong here
Shows active connections, not drops.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This 350-701 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Cisco 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 350-701 exam.