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SY0-701 · domain

Security Architecture

Security Architecture is the domain of the SY0-701 exam that focuses on how to design and implement secure networks, systems, and applications. Think of it as the blueprint for an organization's security posture—deciding where to place firewalls, how to segment a network, what encryption to use, and how to manage access controls. In plain English, it's about making sure that the right people have the right access to the right resources, while keeping bad actors out. For example, a security architect might design a multi-tier web application where the database server is isolated in a separate subnet, accessible only from the application server, and all communication is encrypted with TLS. This domain covers both the theory and practical implementation of such designs. Why is this important for real-world IT and cloud work? Because every company, from startups to global enterprises, relies on secure architectures to protect sensitive data and maintain operations. A misconfigured cloud environment can lead to data breaches costing millions, as seen in incidents like the Capital One breach where a misconfigured web application firewall allowed access to S3 buckets. Understanding Security Architecture helps you prevent such disasters by applying principles like defense in depth, least privilege, and secure segmentation. In cloud environments (AWS, Azure, GCP), you need to know how to set up virtual private clouds, security groups, identity and access management (IAM) roles, and encryption keys. This domain is critical for roles like security analyst, network administrator, cloud engineer, and of course, security architect. On the SY0-701 exam, Security Architecture tests your ability to apply security principles to design and implement secure systems. You'll be asked about secure network architectures (e.g., DMZ, VLANs, VPNs), secure system design (e.g., trusted computing base, hardware security modules), and secure application development (e.g., secure coding practices, application firewalls). The exam also covers cloud and virtualization security, including shared responsibility models, hypervisor security, and container security. You'll need to know how to select and configure security controls like firewalls, intrusion prevention systems, and data loss prevention solutions. Expect scenario-based questions where you must choose the best architecture to meet security requirements—for instance, which network segmentation strategy prevents lateral movement in case of a breach. To study effectively, start by understanding the core principles: defense in depth, least privilege, separation of duties, and secure defaults. Then, map these to concrete technologies: VLANs for segmentation, VPNs for remote access, TLS for encryption, and IAM for access control. Use diagrams to visualize network architectures—draw a typical enterprise network with a DMZ, internal network, and management network. Practice with labs: set up a simple AWS VPC with public and private subnets, configure security groups, and test connectivity. Review common exam traps like confusing encryption in transit vs. at rest, or thinking that a firewall alone provides sufficient security. Focus on the CompTIA Security+ objectives for this domain, and use practice questions to identify weak areas. Remember, the exam is about applying concepts, not just memorizing definitions. Good luck!

182 questions48 easy113 medium21 hard

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What this domain covers

What to know about Security Architecture

Security Architecture on the SY0-701 exam covers how to design and implement secure networks, systems, and applications using principles like defense in depth, segmentation, and least privilege.

Secure network architecture design (e.g., DMZ, VLANs, VPNs)

Secure system design (e.g., trusted platform module, secure boot)

Cloud and virtualization security (e.g., shared responsibility, hypervisor security)

Secure application development (e.g., input validation, secure coding)

Selection and configuration of security controls (e.g., firewalls, IDS/IPS, DLP)

Identity and access management architecture (e.g., SSO, MFA, federation)

Watch out for

Common Security Architecture exam traps

  • Confusing encryption in transit (TLS) with encryption at rest (AES-256)
  • Thinking a firewall is sufficient to protect a network; forgetting defense in depth
  • Assuming cloud security is entirely the provider's responsibility (shared responsibility model)
  • Mixing up secure network segmentation (VLANs) with physical separation (air gaps)

Question index

All Security Architecture questions (182)

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1

Based on the exhibit, which change best reduces the blast radius if a user workstation is compromised?

Medium
2

A company is redesigning its network to host a public-facing web application that accesses a confidential database. The security team needs to minimize the risk of a direct attack against the database server while still allowing the web server to retrieve and update data. Which network architecture best achieves this objective?

Medium
3

After a server rebuild, an administrator notices that Remote Desktop, SMBv1, and Print Spooler are still enabled on a Windows file server even though the server only stores department documents. The security team also wants to know if future changes drift away from the approved build. What should be implemented?

Medium
4

After building a new file server, an administrator reviews the security baseline and notices that a remote desktop service is enabled even though no one uses it. What is the best hardening action?

Easy
5

A help desk team needs to reset passwords on servers during incidents, but they should not keep standing administrator rights all day. Which two controls best support this requirement? Select two.

Easy
6

Based on the exhibit, which change should be made first to secure remote administration of the network device?

Medium
7

Employees need to sign in once to the corporate portal and then access email and the HR app without entering credentials again. Which two technologies make this possible in a secure design? Select two.

Easy
8

Administrators need to manage internal switches from home. Management traffic must be encrypted, MFA must be used, and no switch management interface should be exposed directly to the internet. Which design is best?

Medium
9

A team manages virtual machines in a public cloud and wants an audit trail of who created instances, changed security groups, and modified IAM settings. What should be enabled first?

Easy
10

Field staff use company-owned tablets that also run approved personal apps. Security needs business data isolated from personal data, the ability to wipe only corporate content, and enforcement of screen lock and encryption. Which two controls best fit? Select two.

Medium
11

A contractor signs in to a project portal that fronts several SaaS tools. Access must be granted only if all of the following are true: the user is assigned to the project, the device is managed, and the request occurs during the approved maintenance window. Which access model best supports this requirement?

Hard
12

A team is moving an application to a cloud provider. The cloud provider will secure the physical data center and core infrastructure, while the company must still secure its own application settings and user access. What concept does this describe?

Easy
13

Based on the exhibit, which network change best isolates finance workstations from general user PCs while still allowing printing and application access? VLAN table: - VLAN 20 Users: 10.20.20.0/24 - VLAN 30 Finance: 10.20.30.0/24 - VLAN 40 Printers: 10.20.40.0/24 - VLAN 50 Accounting App: 10.20.50.0/24 Current SVI routing policy: permit ip any any Management goal: Finance devices must not initiate traffic to User VLAN 20, but they must be able to print and access the accounting application.

Medium
14

A regulated analytics workload is moving to a public cloud. The business wants the strongest practical tenant isolation without managing physical servers, and it also needs an audit trail for changes made to the cloud environment. Which two design choices best meet those requirements? Select two.

Medium
15

A help desk manager is hardening a fleet of Windows laptops. The goal is to prevent booting from untrusted external media and to ensure only approved software can run on the devices. Which two controls best address those goals? Select two.

Medium
16

Before applying a major patch to a virtual machine, the administrator wants a quick way to return the VM to its exact pre-change state if the patch fails. What should the administrator create?

Easy
17

A small enterprise is rebuilding its public customer portal. The web front end must be reachable from the internet, the application tier should never be directly exposed, and the database must remain private even if the web server is compromised. Which two design changes best meet those goals? Select two.

Medium
18

A laptop repeatedly starts with an unapproved bootloader, and the security team wants the firmware to refuse boot code that is not signed by a trusted key. Which feature should be used?

Easy
19

A small company is deploying a public web application with a front-end server, an API server, and a database. The web server must be reachable from the internet, the API must be reachable only from the web server, and the database must never be accessible from user subnets. Which design best meets the requirement?

Medium
20

A team is deploying a containerized API to a public cloud. The service must be reachable only by internal corporate applications, and secrets must not be embedded in images or readable as plaintext by administrators of the underlying host. Which two actions best fit the design? Select two.

Hard
21

A company wants employees to use one corporate login for multiple SaaS applications, require MFA when users sign in from unmanaged devices, and centralize account lifecycle management. Which design best meets these requirements?

Medium
22

A security team wants to know whether a workstation has drifted away from the approved hardened configuration after several months of changes. What should they use to compare the current state against the approved setup?

Easy
23

A SaaS vendor hosts a customer relationship platform for multiple organizations. Your company wants to know which two responsibilities typically remain with the customer rather than the SaaS provider. Select two.

Medium
24

A supplier portal is browser-based and used by external partner companies. Each partner already has its own identity provider. The portal must trust assertions from those IdPs and avoid creating separate local passwords for each partner. Which integration is best?

Hard
25

A team hosts a confidential document repository on an IaaS virtual machine. The provider secures the datacenter, hardware, and hypervisor. The organization wants to control who can decrypt the files and be able to revoke that access without changing providers. Which control is best?

Medium
26

A team is moving a workload to infrastructure as a service (IaaS). Which two items are usually the customer's responsibility? Select two.

Easy
27

An online retailer is redesigning its public web application so the web server can receive internet traffic, the application server can only be reached by the web tier, and the database server can only be reached by the application tier. Which placement best supports this design?

Medium
28

A development team runs multiple customer workloads in a shared Kubernetes cluster. Security wants to reduce the risk that one compromised container can read another team's data or deploy an altered image. Which three actions best improve the design? Select three.

Hard
29

A security architect is designing the wireless network for a new branch office. The branch will have two types of users: employees who need access to internal corporate resources, and guests who need internet-only access. The architect plans to use WPA3-Enterprise for the employee SSID and WPA3-SAE for the guest SSID. Which of the following additional configurations is MOST critical to prevent guests from accessing internal corporate resources?

Medium
30

A company wants employees to sign in once to several SaaS apps, while the security team also wants to require extra verification when users sign in from unmanaged devices or unusual locations. Which two architecture changes best satisfy both requirements? Select two.

Medium
31

Based on the exhibit, which logging capability should be enabled first to create an audit trail for cloud administration changes? Exhibit: 2026-04-25 09:14:03 iam:AttachRolePolicy user=alice 2026-04-25 09:15:10 ec2:AuthorizeSecurityGroupIngress user=alice 2026-04-25 09:16:22 s3:PutBucketPolicy user=alice Requirement: Security wants to track management-plane API calls and configuration changes across cloud resources.

Medium
32

A cloud support team is replacing separate logins for several internal apps. The new design must support one sign-in, reduce the chance that a stolen session remains valid too long, and let the identity team revoke access centrally after termination. Which three controls best fit? Select three.

Hard
33

Based on the exhibit, which change would best reduce the attack surface of the public web server while preserving remote administration from the internal network?

Medium
34

A security architect is redesigning the network for a payment card processing environment. The goal is to create a cardholder data environment (CDE) that is isolated from the rest of the corporate network to reduce PCI DSS scope. The CDE will contain only the payment application servers and the database storing credit card numbers. The architect must allow authorized administrators in the corporate network to perform updates and monitoring on the CDE servers. Which of the following network architecture designs provides the strongest isolation while still meeting the requirement for authorized administrative access?

Medium
35

A team moved a Linux VM to IaaS. They need OS login events, process activity, and network flow metadata sent to one central platform for alerting. What is the best first step?

Medium
36

A company runs payroll and HR application servers on the same VLAN because a redesign is not possible this quarter. Security wants to reduce lateral movement if one workload is compromised, but the team cannot renumber the environment or add new physical firewalls. Which control best fits the requirement?

Hard
37

A company is redesigning how systems are separated in its office and data center network. Match each network design element to the scenario it best supports. Use each term once.

Medium
38

Based on the exhibit, which identity architecture change best addresses the repeated password resets and delayed offboarding across the company's SaaS applications? Exhibit: - SaaS A uses local user accounts - SaaS B uses local user accounts - SaaS C supports SAML and automated provisioning - Help desk reports 120 password reset tickets per month - Former employees can remain active in two apps for up to 24 hours after termination Management wants one sign-in and faster deprovisioning.

Medium
39

A customer portal runs on a single application server behind a database cluster. Leadership wants the portal to keep working if that application server fails, but the budget is tight and the team wants the simplest design that can automatically fail over. What should they add?

Medium
40

Based on the exhibit, which cloud service model best fits the application's operational and security requirements?

Medium
41

A company is building a public web app with three tiers. Internet users should reach only the web tier, and the app tier should never be reachable from the internet. Which two network design choices support this goal? Select two.

Easy
42

Match each cloud security concept to the best description.

Easy
43

Match each network segment to the best use in a small enterprise.

Easy
44

A branch office has users, finance workstations, and printers on the same LAN. Management wants finance devices isolated from general users while still allowing approved printing and internet access. Which two changes best meet this goal? Select two.

Easy
45

A web application needs to be internet-facing. The web tier must accept public traffic, the application tier should be reachable only from the web tier, and the database must be reachable only from the application tier. Which design best supports this?

Medium
46

A company is publishing an internet-facing customer portal that must also query an internal database containing order history. Security wants to reduce the chance that a compromise of the portal exposes the database directly. Which design is the best choice?

Medium
47

A customer portal must continue operating if one application server fails. The business wants a simple, cost-conscious design that improves availability. What is the best approach?

Easy
48

After a server rebuild, a Windows administrator notices several unneeded services are still enabled, including Remote Registry and Print Spooler on a server that only hosts a database. What should the administrator do to reduce attack surface and keep the build consistent?

Easy
49

A company uses four cloud applications and wants employees to sign in once with corporate credentials. The applications should trust the company’s identity platform, and disabling a user in the directory should remove access everywhere without separate password resets. Which architecture should the team implement?

Medium
50

A company is implementing network segmentation to isolate the guest wireless network from the internal corporate network. Which of the following technologies is most appropriate to enforce this separation at Layer 2?

Medium
51

A web application must keep running if one application server fails. Management wants the simplest design that automatically switches traffic to a healthy server. Which two choices support that goal? Select two.

Easy
52

A development team stores container images in a registry before deployment. Security wants to reduce the chance of shipping vulnerable libraries or packages inside the image. What should the team do before release?

Easy
53

A customer portal must keep serving requests if one application server stops responding. The team wants traffic to be sent to whichever healthy server is available. Which design should they implement?

Easy
54

Based on the exhibit, what is the best next control to prevent noncompliant mobile devices from accessing corporate email while still allowing IT to wipe company data from lost phones?

Medium
55

A security architect is evaluating a zero trust architecture (ZTA) for a remote workforce. Which three of the following components are essential to the implementation? (Choose three.)

Medium
56

A branch office has users, finance workstations, printers, and IP phones on one flat network. The security team wants to reduce lateral movement if one user PC is compromised, but printers still need to receive print jobs from users. What is the best design change?

Medium
57

Based on the exhibit, which cloud deployment choice best satisfies the workload requirements? Exhibit: Workload requirements: - Processes regulated customer records - Should not share underlying compute with other tenants if avoidable - Team wants provider-managed hardware maintenance - Application will run in a public cloud Which deployment choice is the best fit?

Medium
58

A company wants visibility into who changed settings in its cloud account and what commands ran on a cloud VM. Which two log sources should the team enable first? Select two.

Easy
59

A company uses a SaaS email platform. The provider manages the servers and application code. Which two tasks remain the company's responsibility? Select two.

Easy
60

Based on the exhibit, what is the best security change to address the exposed management access on the cloud VM?

Medium
61

An order-entry application must survive a single server failure and continue serving users if the primary site becomes unavailable. Management wants automatic failover, but does not want to pay for fully active production capacity in two regions. Which design is best?

Hard
62

System administrators need to manage internal switches from home. The solution must encrypt management traffic, strongly authenticate users, and avoid exposing management ports directly to the internet. What should be used?

Easy
63

A company's current remote access solution uses a traditional VPN that grants users full network-layer access to the internal LAN once authenticated. The security architect wants to adopt a zero trust architecture to reduce the risk of lateral movement by compromised endpoints. Which of the following implementations best aligns with zero trust principles?

Medium
64

A customer portal must stay online if an entire site fails, and the company must also be able to recover if data is corrupted or encrypted by ransomware. Which two design choices best satisfy both requirements? Select two.

Hard
65

Guest tablets in a conference room use the same physical switches as employee devices. The security team wants guests to have internet access only, with no route to internal subnets. Which design best meets the goal?

Easy
66

A company wants employees to sign in once to access several SaaS applications, but it also wants to require MFA only when users connect from unmanaged devices or outside the corporate network. Which architecture best supports this goal?

Medium
67

A small company is moving its public web app to a new network. The front-end server must be reachable from the internet, the application server should only accept traffic from the front end, and the database must never be reachable from the internet or user VLANs. Which design best meets these requirements with the least exposure?

Medium
68

An online retailer is redesigning a network for a public web app. Customers must reach only the web tier from the internet. The web tier must reach the application tier, and the application tier must reach the database tier. Which two design changes best support this zoning model? Select two.

Medium
69

Employees sign in once to the company portal and then can access email, the ticketing system, and the HR site without logging in again. What is this called?

Easy
70

Network engineers need to manage switches in a data center from home. The solution must encrypt management traffic, strongly authenticate users, and avoid exposing management ports directly to the internet. Which approach is best?

Medium
71

After a merger, dozens of laptops arrive with inconsistent settings and a history of unsupported utilities installed by the previous owner. The security team wants to establish a known-good configuration, reduce future drift, and accelerate remediation of newly discovered vulnerabilities. Which three actions best support that goal? Select three.

Medium
72

A company wants all corporate laptops to authenticate to Wi-Fi using device certificates instead of shared passwords. It also wants to deny network access to systems that do not meet the baseline requirement for disk encryption and current endpoint protection. Which approach best satisfies both goals?

Medium
73

An online ticketing system must survive a single server failure and continue operating after a primary site outage. The business wants the lowest-cost design that still improves availability. Which architecture is best?

Medium
74

A hospital is redesigning its wireless network. Guest devices must reach only the internet. Staff laptops need access to internal applications. Medical devices must communicate with a monitoring server but never with guest devices or the broader employee LAN. What design best meets these goals with the least operational complexity?

Medium
75

An organization is redesigning its office network. Guest Wi-Fi must reach the internet only, employee laptops need access to internal apps, and a payment-processing system must be separated from general user traffic but still reach one database server. Which design best meets these requirements?

Medium
76

Based on the exhibit, which architecture best meets the goal of keeping the order service running if one application server fails?

Medium
77

Based on the exhibit, what is the best cloud identity control to ensure terminated users lose access to the SaaS application quickly and consistently?

Medium
78

A development team wants to deploy a new internal application without managing operating system patching, runtime updates, or automatic scaling. The security team still wants the company to control the application code and its data access settings. Which cloud service model best fits this need?

Medium
79

A manufacturer needs to grant a partner company access to a procurement portal. Partner users should authenticate with their own identity provider, and the manufacturer does not want to create local passwords for each partner employee. Which design best supports this?

Medium
80

A company wants guest laptops on Wi-Fi to reach the internet but not internal printers or servers. Which two changes best support this design? Select two.

Easy
81

A web application must be reachable from the internet, but its database should be isolated from direct internet access. Which two placements or controls are most appropriate? Select two.

Easy
82

An office wants finance workstations separated from general user PCs, but employees still need to print to a shared printer and access one accounting application. Which change best supports this?

Easy
83

An enterprise is moving from on-prem identity to a SaaS HR platform. Employees should sign in with corporate credentials, and terminated users must lose access quickly without manually creating or deleting SaaS passwords. Which solution best fits?

Medium
84

A Linux operations team has a standing need to restart services and edit protected configuration files on production servers, but administrators should not keep root privileges all day. Every elevation must be approved through a ticket and logged centrally. Which solution best meets this requirement?

Hard
85

Several company laptops were found to boot from a removable drive containing an untrusted pre-boot utility before the operating system loaded. The security team wants to prevent unsigned or tampered boot code from starting. Which control is the best fit?

Medium
86

A company wants guest Wi-Fi to reach only the internet, employee laptops to reach internal apps, and payment servers to remain isolated from both. What is the best design approach?

Easy
87

A payment processor stores full card numbers in its transaction database, but developers and analysts should never see the real numbers in nonproduction reports or troubleshooting tools. The business still needs to correlate the same card across multiple records. Which technique is the best fit?

Medium
88

An organization is placing its public-facing website behind a new security design. The site must be reachable from the internet, but the database and file servers must stay isolated from direct external access. What design should the architect use?

Easy
89

Drag and drop the steps for the TLS 1.3 handshake process into the correct order.

Medium
90

Based on the exhibit, which data protection control best allows analysts to work with the records without exposing full card numbers?

Medium
91

A customer portal must keep operating if one application server fails and also remain available if an entire site goes offline. Management is willing to pay more for automatic failover and the shortest possible interruption. Which design is best?

Medium
92

A manager can access the HR portal normally from a managed laptop, but if they sign in from an unmanaged tablet, the system should require extra verification before granting access. Which control best fits?

Easy
93

A hospital has clinical workstations, badge readers, and building cameras all connected to the same switching infrastructure. After a workstation infection, the security team wants to prevent those endpoints from laterally reaching the badge readers while still allowing the cameras to report to a recording server. What should be implemented first?

Medium
94

An operations team manages Linux servers over SSH. The security team wants to stop direct management access from employee laptops, reduce lateral movement if one admin endpoint is compromised, and keep a log of every administrative session. Which two design choices best fit? Select two.

Hard
95

A company runs a Linux virtual machine in an IaaS cloud service. The provider secures the physical datacenter and hypervisor. Which task remains the company's responsibility?

Easy
96

A customer portal must keep operating if one application server fails. Management wants the simplest and lowest-cost design that still improves availability. What should the team implement?

Medium
97

A SaaS vendor supports both browser access and a mobile app. The company wants employees to sign in with corporate credentials, avoid separate passwords for each app, and use token-based authentication that works well with modern APIs. Which integration should the architect choose?

Medium
98

Network engineers need to administer internal switches from home. The company wants encrypted management traffic, strong user verification, and no management ports exposed directly to the internet. Which approach is best?

Medium
99

An organization is redesigning access for its HR portal. HR staff need to update employee records, managers need to approve leave requests, and payroll staff need access to salary data, but no single user should receive all of those permissions by default. What is the best access model?

Medium
100

A help desk team wants guest Wi-Fi users to access only the internet and nothing on the internal corporate network. Which control should the network team implement at the wireless edge?

Easy
101

A small company is publishing an internal website to the internet. The security team wants the web server reachable from the internet while keeping the database and file share isolated from direct internet access. Which design is best?

Easy
102

A company wants to stop employees from running unauthorized tools downloaded from the internet on managed Windows laptops, but still allow approved internal apps and vendor-updated software. Which control is best?

Medium
103

A company is redesigning a customer portal. Internet users must reach only the web tier, the application tier must be reachable only from the web tier, and the database must be reachable only from the application tier. Administrators should manage servers from a dedicated jump host. Which design best meets these requirements?

Medium
104

A help desk team wants users to be unable to install unsanctioned browser extensions or freeware on corporate Windows laptops, while approved business apps still run. Which endpoint control is best?

Easy
105

A team deploys an e-commerce application on an IaaS virtual machine. The cloud provider secures the datacenter, hardware, and hypervisor. The company wants to reduce the chance that attackers exploit outdated software on the VM itself. Which responsibility remains with the company?

Medium
106

Based on the exhibit, which capability should be added so the SaaS app automatically creates, updates, and disables user accounts as directory changes occur?

Medium
107

An online retailer is moving its public web app, internal API, and database into separate zones. Public users must reach only the web tier. The web tier must contact the app tier, and only the app tier may query the database. Admins should manage all servers from a hardened jump host. Which design best meets these goals and minimizes lateral movement?

Hard
108

A team runs a confidential document repository on an IaaS virtual machine. The cloud provider secures the datacenter, hardware, and hypervisor. Which task remains the organization’s responsibility?

Medium
109

Sales staff use company laptops on public Wi-Fi and travel frequently. The company wants the disk contents unreadable if a laptop is stolen, even if the drive is removed and placed in another system. Which control is the best fit?

Medium
110

An organization stores full payment card numbers, analysts need the last four digits for investigation, and the backup team is worried about ransomware and stolen backup media. Which three controls best address these requirements? Select three.

Hard
111

An HR assistant should be able to view employee records, but should not have access to payroll administration or IT server tools. Which access model is best for assigning permissions by job role?

Easy
112

A Windows file server was built from a gold image, but six months later a scan shows Remote Desktop enabled, SMBv1 re-enabled, and Print Spooler running. The same drift appears on several other servers after emergency troubleshooting. Security wants to return the environment to the approved baseline and prevent the changes from coming back. What is the best solution?

Hard
113

An HR department wants each employee to access only the systems required for their job. A new hire should receive the same permissions as other HR specialists, and changes to the role should update access centrally. Which access model should be used?

Easy
114

A security team discovers that several laptops occasionally boot from a removable drive before Windows loads, allowing unapproved recovery tools to run. Management wants to prevent this with the least impact on normal users. Which control is the best fit?

Medium
115

Based on the exhibit, which backup protection change best improves ransomware resilience and protects the backup media if it is stolen?

Medium
116

A company uses several SaaS applications and wants employees to sign in once with a corporate account instead of maintaining separate passwords for each app. Which architecture is best?

Easy
117

A regulated analytics workload must run in the cloud with the strongest isolation from other customers, but the company does not want to manage its own physical server room. Which placement is most appropriate?

Medium
118

Company-owned tablets are used by field staff for both corporate email and approved personal apps. Security must isolate company data from personal data, allow remote wipe of only the corporate workspace, and block access if the device is rooted or encryption is disabled. Which approach best fits?

Hard
119

A legacy finance application cannot yet support multifactor authentication. The security team still wants administrators to use separate privileged accounts, receive elevated access only when a ticket is approved, and have those privileges removed automatically after the maintenance window ends. Which solution best fits?

Medium
120

A router interface connects the DMZ subnet 10.10.10.0/24 to the internal network. A web server at 10.10.10.25 must reach an application server at 10.10.20.20 on TCP 8443, and all other DMZ-to-internal traffic must be blocked. Which two ACL entries should be applied inbound on the DMZ-facing interface? Select two.

Hard
121

A company is evaluating a multi-tenant SaaS document platform. The security team wants to reduce the impact of another tenant’s breach and ensure employees who leave are removed from the app within minutes. Which two requirements should the team prioritize? Select two.

Hard
122

A customer-facing website must stay available if one of two application servers fails. Which design should the team implement?

Easy
123

A DevOps team stores container images in a registry before deployment. Which two practices reduce the chance of deploying a risky image? Select two.

Easy
124

A company is concerned about ransomware and insider tampering with backups. It wants daily restore points, monthly archives, and protection if a backup drive is stolen from the storage room. Which backup design is the best answer?

Medium
125

A company uses a SaaS CRM platform. The provider patches the application and underlying infrastructure. Which two responsibilities remain with the company? Select two.

Medium
126

The help desk can patch endpoints only after testing on a few pilot systems because one legacy app sometimes breaks after updates. What patching approach is most secure and least disruptive?

Medium
127

A Linux server is being prepared for production as a database host. The build team notices that a graphical desktop environment, an unused FTP service, and an open mail submission port are present on the image, even though none of them are required. The organization wants future builds to be consistent and easy to verify. What is the best approach?

Medium
128

A company moves a Linux server to infrastructure as a service (IaaS). Which task remains the customer's responsibility?

Easy
129

Employees use a browser SaaS portal, a native mobile app, and an internal API. The company wants one corporate identity, reduced password reuse, and automated removal of access when HR terminates users. Which two solutions best meet the requirement? Select two.

Medium
130

A company is placing its public web server so internet users can reach it, but the database server must stay hidden from the internet and be reachable only by the web server. Which design best supports this goal?

Easy
131

A small company is redesigning its network for a public web application. The web front end must be reachable from the internet, but the database should never be exposed directly to external or general user traffic. Which architecture is the best choice?

Medium
132

In a virtualized environment, several workloads share the same physical host and the same IP subnet. After one payroll VM is compromised, the security team wants to prevent that VM from freely scanning or reaching the other workloads on the host. Which control best addresses this lateral-movement risk?

Medium
133

A company wants employees to use their normal login from managed devices but require extra verification when they sign in from an unmanaged laptop or a new location. Which two controls should the team use? Select two.

Easy
134

A customer portal must keep serving users if one application server fails and also remain available if the primary site becomes unreachable. Management prefers automatic recovery over manual intervention. Which two design choices best satisfy the goal? Select two.

Medium
135

A team deploys a Linux virtual machine in IaaS and stores documents in a managed cloud object storage service. The provider secures datacenters, hardware, and the storage platform, but the organization still wants to reduce exposure. Which two tasks remain the organization's responsibility? Select two.

Medium
136

A regulated workload must run in the cloud with the strongest possible isolation from other tenants, and the company wants to avoid managing its own physical hardware. Which placement is the best fit?

Medium
137

A company uses a third-party expense application and wants employees to sign in with their corporate identity once, then automatically lose access in the expense app when they are terminated in the HR system. Which solution best meets both requirements?

Medium
138

An HR portal has three job functions: HR staff update employee records, managers approve leave requests, and payroll views salary data. The security team wants to prevent any one role from having all capabilities. Which access design is the best fit?

Medium
139

An HR portal has three groups: HR staff can edit employee records, managers can approve leave, and payroll can view salary data. No one should have all functions. Which access model should the engineer implement?

Medium
140

Based on the exhibit, which wireless security change best addresses both unauthorized device access and the risk of a lost laptop connecting to corporate resources?

Medium
141

A development team deploys a Linux web server on an IaaS cloud VM. The cloud provider secures the datacenter, hardware, and hypervisor. Which control remains the organization's responsibility?

Medium
142

Which four of the following are key principles of secure network architecture design that help enforce defense-in-depth? (Choose four.)

Medium
143

Based on the exhibit, which change best meets the requirement that guest devices can reach the internet but must not reach any internal subnets or printer VLANs?

Medium
144

Employees must sign in to several SaaS applications with corporate credentials, and terminated users should lose access quickly without manual changes in each app. Which solution best meets the requirement?

Medium
145

Employees use a browser-based SaaS portal, a native expense app, and an internal API. The company wants one corporate identity, API access without separate passwords, and automatic account removal when HR disables a user. Which solution best fits?

Hard
146

A company needs a public website that anyone on the internet can reach, but the application and database servers must stay off the internet. Where should the web server be placed?

Easy
147

A company uses a SaaS file-sharing platform for employee documents. Which action is the company's responsibility, not the provider's?

Easy
148

Based on the exhibit, which network redesign would best limit lateral movement between user endpoints and building systems after a workstation compromise?

Medium
149

A security architect is designing the network security for a web application hosted in a public cloud environment such as AWS. The application uses an Application Load Balancer (ALB) that distributes traffic to a fleet of web servers. The web servers must only accept traffic from the ALB, and all other inbound traffic must be blocked. The ALB itself needs to accept HTTP/HTTPS traffic from anywhere on the internet. Which of the following cloud security controls should the architect configure on the web servers' network interface to best meet this requirement, assuming the cloud provider offers both stateful and stateless network filtering options?

Medium
150

A security architect is designing a new data center network that will host public-facing web servers and internal application servers handling confidential employee data. The architect places the web servers in a DMZ and the internal application servers on a separate internal network segment. A stateful firewall is configured to allow inbound HTTP/HTTPS traffic from the internet to the web servers only. The firewall also permits only the web servers to initiate outbound connections to the internal application servers on a specific TCP port, and all such traffic is encrypted using TLS. Which security architecture principle is this design primarily intended to enforce?

Medium
151

A stateless firewall sits between a DMZ subnet 10.10.10.0/24 and an internal subnet 10.10.20.0/24. Only the web server at 10.10.10.25 should be allowed to initiate TCP sessions to the app server at 10.10.20.20 on port 8443. All other DMZ-to-internal traffic must remain blocked. Which ACL entry is the best fit on the DMZ-facing interface?

Hard
152

Employees must sign in to several cloud applications with their corporate account, and terminated users should lose access without separate password resets in each app. What is the best solution?

Easy
153

A help desk team manages 300 Windows laptops. A legacy accounting app sometimes fails after updates, so the company wants to reduce patch risk while still preventing long-term exposure. Which patching strategy is the best balance?

Medium
154

A company stores customer documents in cloud object storage. The provider already offers encryption at rest and physical security. Which action most directly reduces the risk of unauthorized access to the stored files?

Medium
155

A regulated analytics workload must run in a public cloud with the strongest practical tenant isolation while avoiding management of physical servers. The workload should also remain off the public internet. Which two deployment choices best fit? Select two.

Medium
156

A company wants employees to sign in once with corporate credentials and access multiple SaaS apps without creating separate passwords for each service. Which two features best support this goal? Select two.

Easy
157

Match each design requirement to the best security architecture control. Use each control once.

Hard
158

An HR system marks employees as hired, transferred, or terminated. The security team wants those changes to create, update, or disable accounts in multiple SaaS apps automatically after the user authenticates through the company identity provider. Which capability should be added?

Medium
159

A company moved an internal application to a cloud virtual machine. The security team wants operating system login events, process activity, and network flow metadata to be available in the SIEM for investigations. Which action best supports that goal?

Medium
160

Field staff use company-owned tablets that also run approved personal apps. Security wants corporate email and documents separated from personal data, with the ability to wipe only the work data if a device is lost. What is the best control?

Easy
161

A company manages 300 laptops and wants to reduce risk from missed patches while avoiding a widespread outage if an update has compatibility issues. Which patching approach is the best choice?

Medium
162

Employees use several SaaS applications, and the security team wants one corporate login, MFA for unmanaged devices, and centralized account provisioning. Which architecture should be used?

Medium
163

Administrators must manage network switches from home. Requirements: encrypted management traffic, MFA for users, no management ports exposed to the Internet, and centralized logging of admin sessions. Which solution best meets the requirements?

Hard
164

A DevOps team builds container images in a CI/CD pipeline. Security wants to reduce the chance of deploying vulnerable libraries and also wants the cluster to reject images that have not been approved. Which approach best meets both requirements?

Medium
165

A team stores sensitive archives on cloud block storage. The provider already encrypts disks at rest, but the company wants copies of the disks to remain unreadable even if a cloud administrator can snapshot and mount the volume. Which control is best?

Hard
166

A security architect at a retail company is deploying a new e-commerce platform that processes credit card payments. The architect needs to minimize the scope of the PCI DSS assessment. The platform consists of a web server, an application server, and a database server. The cardholder data (credit card numbers) will be processed and stored only on the database server. Which of the following network architecture designs would best reduce the PCI DSS scope?

Medium
167

A security team wants to reduce the chance that employees boot unmanaged tools from removable media and wants only approved software to run on laptops. Which two controls should they use? Select two.

Easy
168

Field technicians use company-owned tablets that also run approved personal apps. Security needs corporate email and documents isolated from personal data, selective wipe of only business content if a device is lost, and compliance checks before access is allowed. What should be deployed?

Medium
169

A finance workflow currently lets one employee create a payment batch and approve it in the same session. Audit findings say the design increases fraud risk. Which two access architecture changes best reduce that risk while keeping the process functional? Select two.

Medium
170

A customer portal runs from a primary data center. Management wants the secondary site to take over within minutes if the primary site loses power, and the secondary site should already have current systems and data ready to serve users. Which design best fits this requirement?

Medium
171

Sales representatives use company-managed smartphones for email, CRM, and document access. If a phone is lost, IT must remove only the corporate apps and work data without erasing the employee's personal photos and contacts. Which control should be used?

Medium
172

Company-owned tablets run both business apps and approved personal apps. Which two controls best keep company data separated and support selective wipe? Select two.

Easy
173

A development team is moving a regulated application to a cloud platform. The security architect wants the strongest practical separation from other customers without buying and operating physical servers. Which hosting option is most appropriate?

Medium
174

Based on the exhibit, which integration best lets the SaaS application trust the company's existing identity provider so users can sign in with their corporate credentials?

Medium
175

Based on the exhibit, which action best addresses both the unsanctioned software problem and the need for consistent endpoint configuration? Exhibit: Device group: Sales-Laptops Baseline check: - Approved browser: installed - Approved EDR: installed - Unapproved remote admin tool: detected on 14 endpoints - Local administrator rights: granted to all users in group - Patch compliance: 68% Management wants to prevent unauthorized software from running and keep future builds consistent.

Medium
176

Employees sign in once to the corporate portal and then open email, the ticketing system, and an HR application without entering credentials again. The external SaaS providers should trust the company's identity provider rather than creating separate user databases. What architecture is being used?

Medium
177

A security operations center (SOC) analyst is overwhelmed by the volume of alerts. The management wants to implement a solution that can automatically respond to common threats, such as blocking an IP address or isolating a compromised endpoint, without requiring human intervention. Which of the following technologies best meets this requirement?

Medium
178

Based on the exhibit, which control should be enabled so corporate data stays separated from personal data on company-owned tablets?

Medium
179

Based on the exhibit, which hardening change best prevents a laptop from booting unapproved tools from external media? Exhibit: UEFI Setup - Secure Boot: Disabled - Boot order: USB, External NIC, Internal SSD - Firmware admin password: Not configured - BitLocker status: Enabled Incident note: A technician confirmed the laptop was started from a USB recovery stick that bypassed the normal corporate login workflow.

Medium
180

A manufacturer wants to give partner-company users access to a procurement portal. The partner wants to authenticate its own users, and the manufacturer does not want to create separate local passwords for them. What is the best solution?

Medium
181

Based on the exhibit, which access design change best reduces fraud risk without stopping the payroll process? Exhibit: Payroll application roles: - HR-Editor: can update employee records - Payroll-Approver: can release payment batches - Audit-Reader: can view reports only Current assignment: User Lisa has both HR-Editor and Payroll-Approver because she "handles payroll end to end." Management wants to reduce the chance of one person creating and approving a fraudulent payment.

Medium
182

A security architect is designing a solution to process highly sensitive financial transactions in a shared cloud environment. The architect needs to ensure that the processor and memory used to handle transaction data are isolated from the host operating system and other virtual machines, even if the hypervisor is compromised. Which technology is specifically designed to provide this level of isolation for code and data during runtime?

Medium

Frequently asked questions

What does the Security Architecture domain cover on the SY0-701 exam?
Security Architecture on the SY0-701 exam covers how to design and implement secure networks, systems, and applications using principles like defense in depth, segmentation, and least privilege.
How many questions are in this domain?
This page lists all 182 Security Architecture questions in the SY0-701 question bank. The actual exam draws from this domain proportionally to its weighting in the official exam blueprint.
What is the best way to practise this domain?
Start with a short focused session (10 questions) to identify gaps, then work through explanations. Repeat with a longer session once the weak areas feel solid.
Can I practise only Security Architecture questions?
Yes — the session launcher on this page filters questions to this domain only. Choose any session length for inline explanations and scoring.
Security+ SY0-701 Security Architecture Practice Questions