NSE4 Firewall Policies and NAT Practice Question
A FortiGate is configured with two policies: Policy A allows traffic from trust to untrust with schedule 'WorkHours' (Mon-Fri 9-17). Policy B allows traffic from trust to untrust with schedule 'Always'. A user sends traffic at 8:00 AM on Saturday. Which policy matches?
⚠ Common exam trap
Many candidates assume the first matching policy in the list always applies, forgetting that an inactive schedule causes the policy to be skipped entirely, allowing a later policy with 'Always' to match.
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
✓
Policy B because Policy A's schedule is not active
Policy B is correct because at 8:00 AM on Saturday, the 'WorkHours' schedule (Mon-Fri 9-17) is not active. FortiGate evaluates policies sequentially; when the first matching policy's schedule is inactive, the firewall skips it and continues to the next policy. Policy B with schedule 'Always' matches and permits the traffic.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Policy B because Policy A's schedule is not active
Why this is correct
FortiGate checks schedule objects as part of policy matching. Policy A's WorkHours schedule covers only Monday to Friday 09:00-17:00, so at 08:00 on Saturday it is inactive and cannot match; evaluation continues to Policy B, whose Always schedule is active.
- ✗
Policy A because schedules are evaluated after policy order
Why it's wrong here
Schedules are evaluated as part of matching each policy in order, not after policy order is resolved, and Policy A's WorkHours schedule is inactive on Saturday morning. Policy A would match only during Monday-Friday 09:00-17:00, when its schedule is active.
- ✗
Both policies match and the first one in order is used
Why it's wrong here
FortiGate evaluates policies sequentially and stops at the first match, but Policy A's WorkHours schedule is inactive at 08:00 Saturday, so it cannot match; Policy B then matches. Assuming both match ignores that an inactive schedule removes the policy from consideration entirely.
- ✗
No policy matches because Policy A is first but schedule inactive
Why it's wrong here
Policy A's schedule is inactive, so FortiGate skips it and continues evaluating, reaching Policy B, whose Always schedule matches. Concluding that no policy matches wrongly treats an inactive schedule as a terminal condition rather than a skip to the next policy.
Go deeper
Related to this question
About these practice questions
This NSE4 question is part of Courseiva's 773-question bank — original exam-style content with full explanations and wrong-answer analysis, never real exam questions or exam dumps. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This NSE4 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Fortinet 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 NSE4 exam.