CEH · domain
Advanced Topics: Wireless, Cloud, IoT, Cryptography
This domain covers wireless encryption (WPA3/SAE, WPA2 flaws), cloud and IoT attack surfaces, and cryptographic weaknesses. CEH tests it through tool identification (Reaver, aircrack-ng), attack naming (collision, evil twin, rogue AP), and log or certificate analysis to classify the attack in scenario questions.
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What to know about Advanced Topics: Wireless, Cloud, IoT, Cryptography
Identify wireless protocols, cryptographic attacks, and cloud/IoT threats by name and tool. Most important: match each scenario to the correct attack class, especially WPA3 SAE versus WPA2 PSK, and distinguish hash collisions from other cryptographic failures.
WPA3 Simultaneous Authentication of Equals (SAE) replacing WPA2 pre-shared key exchange, adding forward secrecy
WPS PIN brute-force attacks using Reaver against Wi-Fi Protected Setup enabled access points
MD5 hash collision attacks producing identical digests from two distinct inputs
Rogue or untrusted certificate chain analysis indicating man-in-the-middle or spoofed CA issuance
Watch out for
Common Advanced Topics: Wireless, Cloud, IoT, Cryptography exam traps
- ▸Confusing WPA3 SAE with WPA2-PSK: SAE resists offline dictionary attacks, WPA2 four-way handshake capture does not.
- ▸Mixing up hash collision with preimage attack: collisions need two differing inputs with equal digests, not reversing a hash.
- ▸Assuming any untrusted root CA means compromise; it may be a rogue, self-signed, or misconfigured intermediate chain.
Question index
All Advanced Topics: Wireless, Cloud, IoT, Cryptography questions (119)
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Which THREE of the following are common IoT attack vectors?
Medium2Which THREE of the following are valid defenses against WPA2 attacks? (Select three)
Hard3A security team is evaluating wireless security for a corporate network. They want to implement the strongest current encryption standard for Wi-Fi. Which of the following should they choose?
Medium4An IoT device uses MQTT protocol with default credentials 'admin/admin' and no TLS encryption. An attacker on the same network captures MQTT packets and extracts sensor data. Which two vulnerabilities are being exploited? (Choose the best combination)
Medium5A security engineer wants to ensure that a wireless network uses the most secure encryption available. Which of the following should be configured on the access point?
Medium6A security analyst captures a WPA2 4-way handshake using airodump-ng. Which tool would they use to perform a dictionary attack on the captured handshake to recover the PSK?
Easy7An attacker sets up a fake access point with the same SSID as a legitimate corporate network. Clients connecting to this AP are prompted to enter their network credentials. Which type of attack is this?
Medium8An IoT device uses the MQTT protocol without TLS. A security tester connects to the broker and subscribes to all topics using '#'. What is the tester MOST likely able to accomplish?
Medium9A penetration tester executes the following command: 'reaver -i wlan0mon -b 00:11:22:33:44:55 -vv'. Which attack is being performed?
Medium10Which TWO of the following are common attack vectors against IoT devices? (Select 2)
Medium11Which of the following is a cryptographic attack that exploits collisions in hash functions?
Medium12Which THREE of the following are characteristics of asymmetric encryption?
Medium13During a penetration test, a tester captures a WPA2 4-way handshake. Which of the following is the NEXT step to attempt to recover the Wi-Fi passphrase?
Medium14During a penetration test, an ethical hacker runs the following command: aireplay-ng -0 5 -a 00:11:22:33:44:55 -c 66:77:88:99:AA:BB wlan0mon. What is the immediate effect of this command?
Medium15An IoT device uses the MQTT protocol without TLS. An attacker on the same network captures messages and publishes a fake temperature reading. Which attack is being executed?
Hard16What is the primary purpose of the 4-way handshake in WPA/WPA2-Personal?
Easy17Which TWO of the following are common attack vectors against IoT devices? (Select TWO.)
Medium18A security analyst observes repeated de-authentication packets targeting clients on a corporate Wi-Fi network. What is the MOST likely goal of the attacker?
Medium19Which TWO of the following are cloud-specific security threats?
Easy20A security analyst captures a WPA2 4-way handshake using airodump-ng. Which tool would they most likely use next to attempt to crack the PSK using a wordlist?
Easy21Which tool is specifically designed to assess the security configuration of AWS, Azure, and GCP cloud environments by scanning for misconfigurations in services like S3, IAM, and EC2?
Easy22In PKI, what is the primary role of a Certificate Authority (CA)?
Easy23Which wireless security standard introduced in 2018 uses Simultaneous Authentication of Equals (SAE) to replace the pre-shared key exchange in WPA2, providing forward secrecy and resistance to offline dictionary attacks?
Easy24Which TWO tools are specifically designed for cloud security auditing and exploitation? (Choose two.)
Medium25A security analyst captures network traffic and sees the following: Client sends a SYN, server responds with SYN-ACK, then client sends ACK. Immediately after, the client sends an encrypted payload. This traffic is consistent with which phase of a WPA2 attack?
Hard26In the cloud shared responsibility model, which of the following is typically the responsibility of the customer when using AWS EC2 (IaaS)?
Medium27Which THREE of the following are common attack vectors against IoT devices? (Choose three.)
Hard28Which of the following cryptographic algorithms is classified as asymmetric?
Easy29During a penetration test, a tester captures the WPA2 4-way handshake with airodump-ng and then uses aircrack-ng with a wordlist. However, the PSK is not found. Which of the following is the MOST likely reason?
Medium30Which TWO of the following are asymmetric encryption algorithms? (Choose two.)
Easy31Which of the following attacks is characterized by an attacker placing a fake wireless access point with the same SSID as a legitimate network to capture client credentials?
Medium32An attacker uses Reaver against a Wi-Fi network. What vulnerability is the attacker primarily exploiting?
Medium33Which THREE of the following are cryptanalysis attacks that target hash functions? (Choose three.)
Hard34In the shared responsibility model for cloud computing, which of the following is typically the customer's responsibility?
Easy35Which TWO of the following are common attack vectors for IoT devices? (Select two)
Medium36An analyst captures the following output from a wireless adapter: `[00:1A:2B:3C:4D:5E] 54 Mbps WPA2 CCMP PSK`. The analyst suspects a malicious rogue AP is impersonating a legitimate network. Which of the following indicators would MOST strongly confirm a rogue AP?
Hard37Which of the following is a well-known attack against the MD5 hash function that allows two different inputs to produce the same hash value?
Easy38Which of the following tools is specifically designed for auditing cloud environments (AWS, Azure, GCP) for security misconfigurations?
Easy39A security analyst runs the following command: 'wget http://example.com/bucket?list-type=2' and receives a listing of objects. Which cloud misconfiguration is this MOST likely exploiting?
Medium40Which of the following is the PRIMARY reason that MD5 is no longer recommended for use in digital signatures?
Medium41An attacker performs a downgrade attack on a TLS connection, forcing the client and server to negotiate a weaker cipher suite. This attack exploits which of the following?
Medium42A penetration tester uses the tool 'Pacu' during an assessment. Which of the following actions is Pacu designed to perform?
Medium43Which THREE of the following are common attack vectors against IoT devices?
Hard44Which THREE of the following are valid methods to prevent a downgrade attack on TLS? (Select 3)
Hard45Which cryptographic algorithm is vulnerable to a birthday attack on its hash output size of 128 bits, reducing the effective security to 64 bits against collision resistance?
Hard46During a cloud penetration test, you discover an S3 bucket that allows listing objects. You find a file named 'config.json' that contains an IAM access key and secret key. Which of the following is the BEST next step?
Hard47A security team finds that a web application accepts a user-supplied URL and fetches it server-side without validation. The application runs on AWS EC2 with a metadata endpoint at 169.254.169.254. Which attack is MOST likely to succeed?
Hard48Which TWO of the following are characteristics of symmetric encryption? (Select two)
Easy49A security analyst discovers that a containerized application running in a cloud environment can access the host's file system by mounting /var/run/docker.sock inside the container. Which type of attack does this configuration enable?
Hard50An attacker intercepts a TLS-encrypted session and attempts to force the client and server to use a weaker cipher suite. Which type of attack is being performed?
Hard51A penetration tester uses the tool 'ScoutSuite' against an AWS target. Which of the following BEST describes the purpose of this tool?
Medium52Which THREE of the following are effective countermeasures against evil twin attacks in wireless networks? (Select THREE.)
Hard53During a cloud penetration test, a tester discovers an AWS S3 bucket that allows public 's3:PutObject' access. The tester uploads a file containing JavaScript that steals cookies. Which type of attack is this an example of?
Hard54A security analyst captures network traffic and sees multiple ARP packets with the same source MAC address but different IP addresses. Which attack is MOST likely occurring?
Easy55An attacker gains access to a cloud environment and attempts to move laterally by assuming an IAM role with higher privileges. Which cloud attack vector is the attacker exploiting?
Medium56Which cryptographic algorithm is classified as symmetric and uses a block cipher with key sizes of 128, 192, or 256 bits?
Medium57Which of the following cryptographic hash functions is known to be vulnerable to collision attacks and should be avoided for security applications?
Easy58Which THREE of the following are components of PKI (Public Key Infrastructure)?
Medium59Which of the following is a recommended countermeasure against WPA2 KRACK attacks?
Medium60A company wants to ensure that data in transit between its IoT devices and the cloud server is encrypted. Which protocol combination is BEST suited for this purpose?
Medium61An attacker sets up a rogue access point with the same SSID as a legitimate corporate network and broadcasts a stronger signal. Clients connect to the rogue AP. What type of attack is this?
Medium62A security team discovers that an attacker has been intercepting and modifying traffic between a client and server by impersonating both endpoints. Which type of cryptographic attack is this?
Medium63In the shared responsibility model for cloud computing, which of the following is typically the responsibility of the customer?
Easy64A security analyst captures WPA2 handshake packets using airodump-ng and then runs aircrack-ng with a wordlist. After several minutes, aircrack-ng reports 'KEY FOUND!' followed by a hex string. Which attack was successfully performed?
Medium65Which TWO of the following are examples of asymmetric cryptography? (Select 2)
Medium66A security analyst captures a large number of initialization vectors (IVs) on a WEP-protected network. Which tool is most commonly used to crack the WEP key using IVs?
Easy67An IoT device uses the MQTT protocol without TLS. An attacker on the same network subscribes to all topics and captures messages. What is the MOST significant security risk?
Medium68A security analyst notices that a web application's SSL/TLS certificate is issued by a CA that is not trusted by modern browsers. Which type of attack could this enable?
Medium69During an IoT assessment, a tester examines a smart thermostat that uses the MQTT protocol. The tester finds that the device connects to a broker without any authentication. Which of the following attacks is MOST likely to succeed?
Hard70A penetration tester discovers that a cloud application is vulnerable to Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF). Which of the following is a potential impact of this vulnerability?
Hard71Which of the following is a hashing algorithm that produces a 160-bit (20-byte) hash value?
Easy72Which cryptographic algorithm is classified as symmetric and uses a block cipher with a fixed block size of 128 bits, supporting key sizes of 128, 192, and 256 bits?
Easy73A security analyst captures a WPA2 4-way handshake using airodump-ng. To crack the PSK, which tool would they MOST likely use next?
Medium74A penetration tester uses the following command to attack a WPS-enabled AP: 'reaver -i mon0 -b 00:11:22:33:44:55 -vv'. What is the primary goal of this attack?
Medium75A security team discovers that an S3 bucket configured for static website hosting is exposing sensitive documents. The bucket policy allows public read access. Which AWS misconfiguration is MOST likely present?
Hard76Which TWO of the following are symmetric encryption algorithms? (Select 2)
Medium77During a wireless penetration test, a tester captures the 4-way handshake between a client and WPA2-PSK access point. Which tool would the tester MOST likely use to attempt to recover the pre-shared key?
Medium78A security analyst is investigating a potential container escape in a Kubernetes cluster. Which THREE of the following are common indicators of a container escape?
Hard79Which THREE of the following are valid methods for exploiting cloud misconfigurations? (Select 3)
Hard80Which of the following tools is specifically designed for assessing the security of AWS environments by checking for misconfigurations in services like S3, IAM, and EC2?
Easy81Which of the following is a symmetric encryption algorithm that uses a block cipher with a fixed block size of 128 bits and key sizes of 128, 192, or 256 bits?
Easy82Which TWO of the following are symmetric encryption algorithms? (Select TWO.)
Easy83A security analyst captures a large number of weak initialization vectors (IVs) using airodump-ng. Which attack does this preparation indicate?
Easy84An analyst sees the following in a log: Client sends a request to https://victim.com/api?url=http://169.254.169.254/latest/meta-data/. This is MOST indicative of which attack?
Medium85Which of the following tools is specifically designed to exploit WPS vulnerabilities on wireless networks?
Medium86A security engineer analyzes a cloud environment and finds that an S3 bucket named 'company-backups' is configured with a bucket policy that allows 'Principal': '*' and 'Action': 's3:GetObject'. Which of the following is the MOST likely risk?
Hard87A security team uses ScoutSuite to assess their AWS environment. The tool reports that an S3 bucket policy allows access from any IP address. What is the MOST likely misconfiguration?
Hard88A cloud security engineer notices that an S3 bucket named 'company-backup' is configured to allow 's3:GetObject' access to 'Principal: *'. Which attack is this misconfiguration MOST likely to enable?
Hard89Which TWO of the following are symmetric encryption algorithms?
Easy90Which TWO of the following are common defense measures against wireless de-authentication attacks? (Select 2)
Medium91In an IoT environment, a researcher finds that the firmware of a smart lock can be extracted via UART and reversed to reveal hardcoded encryption keys. Which type of vulnerability is this?
Medium92Which cloud security assessment tool is specifically designed to audit AWS environments for misconfigurations and provides a detailed report of findings?
Easy93During a cloud security audit, a tool reports that an AWS IAM role has a policy allowing 'ec2:RunInstances' with a condition 'aws:SourceIp': '0.0.0.0/0'. What is the most immediate risk?
Medium94Which TWO of the following are common weaknesses in IoT devices that are often exploited by attackers?
Medium95Which TWO of the following correctly describe aspects of the shared responsibility model in cloud computing?
Easy96A penetration tester uses the tool 'Pacu' during an AWS security assessment. Which phase of testing is Pacu most commonly associated with?
Medium97During a wireless penetration test, the tester runs `airodump-ng wlan0mon` and sees numerous beacon frames from a network. The tester then sends deauthentication packets using `aireplay-ng -0 5 -a <BSSID> wlan0mon`. What is the PRIMARY purpose of this deauthentication attack?
Medium98A penetration tester is assessing the security of a cloud application and discovers that it is vulnerable to Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF). Which TWO of the following are potential impacts of this vulnerability?
Medium99A security analyst captures a large number of unique initialization vectors (IVs) from a wireless network using airodump-ng. Which attack are they MOST likely preparing to execute?
Easy100A security analyst observes an SSL/TLS handshake where the client and server negotiate TLS 1.0 instead of TLS 1.2, despite the server supporting TLS 1.2. Which attack BEST describes the manipulation of the handshake to force weaker encryption?
Hard101Which TWO of the following attacks are specifically associated with wireless networks?
Hard102In a cloud environment, an attacker exploits a vulnerability in a web application to make the server send requests to internal metadata endpoints (e.g., http://169.254.169.254/latest/meta-data/). This yields IAM temporary credentials. Which attack is this?
Hard103A security analyst observes that a server running an IoT device management platform is sending MQTT traffic to an unexpected IP address. The analyst also notes that the device's firmware contains hardcoded credentials. Which attack vector is MOST likely being exploited?
Hard104An IoT device uses the MQTT protocol without any authentication or encryption. An attacker on the same network subscribes to all topics on the MQTT broker. Which of the following is the MOST effective immediate countermeasure?
Hard105A penetration tester is assessing an AWS environment and discovers an S3 bucket with the following bucket policy: `{"Version":"2012-10-17","Statement":[{"Effect":"Allow","Principal":"*","Action":"s3:GetObject","Resource":"arn:aws:s3:::example-bucket/*"}]}`. Which of the following is the MOST likely security issue?
Hard106During a penetration test, an analyst runs the following command: 'reaver -i wlan0mon -b 00:11:22:33:44:55 -vv'. What is the PRIMARY purpose of this command?
Medium107A security analyst observes the following log entry on a web server: 'GET /?url=http://169.254.169.254/latest/meta-data/ HTTP/1.1'. This request appears to originate from a compromised web application. Which cloud attack technique is being attempted?
Medium108Which cloud security assessment tool is specifically designed to audit AWS environments against best practices and CIS benchmarks?
Medium109During a penetration test, you capture the following 4-way handshake using airodump-ng. Which tool would you use to attempt a dictionary attack to recover the WPA2 passphrase?
Medium110In a cloud environment, which of the following is an example of a Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF) attack?
Medium111Which TWO of the following tools are used for cloud security auditing or exploitation?
Medium112A penetration tester uses the tool Reaver to target a Wi-Fi network. What vulnerability is the tester attempting to exploit?
Medium113An IoT device uses MQTT for communication. An attacker intercepts MQTT packets and observes that the publish messages are not encrypted and contain plaintext sensor data. Which of the following is the BEST recommendation to secure MQTT traffic?
Medium114A cloud security engineer discovers that an S3 bucket named 'acme-backups' is accessible to anyone with the bucket URL. The bucket contains sensitive customer data. Which AWS shared responsibility model component does this misconfiguration primarily violate?
Medium115A security engineer observes the following log event: 'Certificate for www.example.com was issued by an intermediate CA that chains to a root CA not in the trusted store.' Which type of attack might this indicate?
Hard116A penetration tester is analyzing a captured TLS 1.3 handshake between a client and a server. The tester notices that the server's certificate is signed with RSA-PSS and the key exchange uses X25519. Which of the following statements is TRUE regarding the security of this handshake?
Medium117A penetration tester performs a container escape by exploiting a misconfigured capability and mounts the host filesystem. Which cloud service model is MOST directly affected?
Hard118A penetration tester performs a container escape from a Docker container running in a cloud environment. Which of the following is the MOST likely cause?
Hard119Which asymmetric encryption algorithm is based on the algebraic structure of elliptic curves over finite fields and provides equivalent security to RSA with smaller key sizes?
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Frequently asked questions
- What does the Advanced Topics: Wireless, Cloud, IoT, Cryptography domain cover on the CEH exam?
- Identify wireless protocols, cryptographic attacks, and cloud/IoT threats by name and tool. Most important: match each scenario to the correct attack class, especially WPA3 SAE versus WPA2 PSK, and distinguish hash collisions from other cryptographic failures.
- How many questions are in this domain?
- This page lists all 119 Advanced Topics: Wireless, Cloud, IoT, Cryptography questions in the CEH 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 Advanced Topics: Wireless, Cloud, IoT, Cryptography questions?
- Yes — the session launcher on this page filters questions to this domain only. Choose any session length for inline explanations and scoring.