PDE Storing the Data Practice Question
A financial services company stores transaction logs in Cloud Storage. Regulatory requirements mandate that each object be retained for exactly seven years and that no user, including project owners, can delete or modify the objects during that period. The company wants to enforce this with minimal administrative overhead. What should they do?
⚠ Common exam trap
Many candidates confuse lifecycle management or IAM restrictions with true immutability, which only a locked retention policy provides.
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
✓
Create a bucket with a retention policy of seven years and lock the policy.
A locked retention policy on a Cloud Storage bucket enforces a minimum retention period and prevents deletion or modification of objects, even by project owners. Locking the policy makes it permanent, satisfying the seven-year WORM requirement. Lifecycle rules, IAM restrictions, or a nonexistent 'bucket policy' cannot provide the same immutable guarantee, making the locked retention policy the correct and minimal-overhead solution.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Enable Uniform Bucket-Level Access and grant only the Storage Object Viewer role to all users.
Why it's wrong here
Uniform Bucket-Level Access simplifies permissions, and granting only viewer roles reduces accidental deletion, but it does not prevent a project owner or someone with sufficient IAM permissions from deleting objects or changing the policy. It is an access control measure, not an immutability guarantee. The requirement explicitly includes project owners, so IAM alone is insufficient.
- ✓
Create a bucket with a retention policy of seven years and lock the policy.
Why this is correct
A locked retention policy enforces a minimum retention period during which objects cannot be deleted or overwritten, even by project owners. Locking the policy makes it permanent and irreversible, satisfying the WORM requirement. This is a native Cloud Storage feature that requires no custom code or external tooling, minimizing administrative overhead while meeting the exact seven-year retention mandate.
- ✗
Configure a Cloud Storage bucket lock using a bucket policy with a seven-year retention period.
Why it's wrong here
There is no Cloud Storage feature called a 'bucket policy' for retention. The correct feature is a bucket retention policy, and it must be locked to enforce immutability. This option uses inaccurate terminology and would not achieve the required WORM behavior. It is a distractor that sounds plausible but does not correspond to a real Cloud Storage capability.
- ✗
Use Object Lifecycle Management to transition objects to Archive storage after 30 days and delete after seven years.
Why it's wrong here
Lifecycle rules automate storage class transitions and deletion, but they do not prevent users from deleting or modifying objects before the seven-year period. They are not a compliance enforcement mechanism. The requirement is to block deletion entirely, which lifecycle management cannot do; it only schedules actions and does not provide immutability.
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JA
Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official Google Cloud exam blueprint
This PDE practice question is part of Courseiva's free Google Cloud 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 PDE exam.