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CV0-004 Practice Question: A company uses a cloud-based object storage…
A company uses a cloud-based object storage service to store backups. The backups must be retained for seven years to meet compliance requirements. Which storage tier should be used to minimize cost while meeting the retention requirement?
⚠ Common exam trap
It's easy for candidates to confuse 'archival storage' (which has a 90-day minimum and higher retrieval costs) with 'cold storage' (which has no minimum and lower storage costs), leading them to choose Option A instead of B.
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
✓
Cold storage with a retrieval time of several hours.
Cold storage (e.g., Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive or Azure Blob Storage Cool/Archive tier) offers the lowest cost for long-term retention while still allowing retrieval within several hours, which is acceptable for backup compliance. The seven-year retention requirement exceeds the typical 90-day minimum for archival tiers, but cold storage has no such minimum and is optimized for data accessed less than once a year, making it the most cost-effective choice.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Archival storage with a minimum retention period of 90 days.
Why it's wrong here
Archival storage may have early deletion fees but is still a good option; however, cold storage is more commonly recommended for long-term backups.
- ✓
Cold storage with a retrieval time of several hours.
Why this is correct
Correct. Cold storage offers low cost for long-term retention, and retrieval time is acceptable for backup restoration.
- ✗
Infrequent access storage with a retrieval fee.
Why it's wrong here
Infrequent access is cheaper than standard but still more expensive than cold storage for 7-year retention.
- ✗
Standard storage with life-cycle policies to delete after seven years.
Why it's wrong here
Standard storage is more expensive; life-cycle policies only handle deletion, not cost optimization.
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 CV0-004 practice question is part of Courseiva's free CompTIA 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 CV0-004 exam.