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CRISC Practice Question: During a risk assessment for a critical financial…
During a risk assessment for a critical financial application, the IT risk manager identifies a vulnerability in the application's authentication module. The exploit would require authenticated access. Which risk rating is most appropriate if the vulnerability has a CVSS base score of 9.0, but the application is behind a strong firewall and requires two-factor authentication?
⚠ Common exam trap
Watch out — candidates often assume a high CVSS base score automatically dictates a High or Very High risk rating, ignoring the CRISC principle that risk must be evaluated after applying compensating controls and environmental modifiers.
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
✓
Medium, after considering the compensating controls
The CVSS base score of 9.0 reflects the intrinsic severity of the vulnerability, but the final risk rating must incorporate compensating controls. The strong firewall and two-factor authentication (2FA) significantly reduce the likelihood of exploitation, as the attacker would need to bypass both network-level filtering and an additional authentication factor. In CRISC methodology, risk is a function of likelihood and impact; here, the controls lower the likelihood, resulting in a Medium residual risk rating despite the high base score.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Medium, after considering the compensating controls
Why this is correct
CVSS base scores assume no environmental mitigations. The firewall restricting exposure and two-factor authentication raising exploitation difficulty are compensating controls that reduce likelihood, so the contextual rating drops from critical to medium despite the 9.0 base score.
- ✗
Low, because the application requires authenticated access
Why it's wrong here
Authenticated access alone does not make exploitation unlikely, since valid credentials are commonly obtained through phishing or reuse. Low suits vulnerabilities requiring privileged local access with no realistic attack path, not an internet-facing authentication flaw.
- ✗
High, because CVSS base score is 9.0
Why it's wrong here
The CVSS base score reflects intrinsic severity before environmental factors; it ignores the firewall and two-factor authentication that lower likelihood here. High would be correct where no compensating controls exist and the vulnerability is remotely exploitable without authentication.
- ✗
Very high, due to the criticality of the application
Why it's wrong here
Application criticality drives impact, not likelihood, so it cannot alone justify a very high rating when two-factor authentication and the firewall materially reduce exploitability. Very high suits scenarios where a critical asset also faces readily exploitable, unauthenticated attack paths with severe business consequences.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This CRISC practice question is part of Courseiva's free ISACA 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 CRISC exam.