CCNA Systems Lifecycle Management Questions

Selecting controls involves balancing business requirements, regulatory compliance, and the actual threat landscape to ensure a proportionate risk response.

An SBOM provides a comprehensive list of all components, libraries, and modules used in an application, which is crucial for managing supply chain security risks (e.g., identifying vulnerable dependencies).

The Interconnection Security Agreement (ISA) specifically outlines the security requirements and responsibilities for connecting two systems.

Using Jira's 'Workflow Validator' or 'Conditions' on the transition to the 'Ready for Production' status enforces that approvals (e.g., from an authorized manager) are logged before code can be merged.

AWS CloudTrail provides the audit trail of API calls and infrastructure changes, which is the cornerstone of change control auditing.

Implementing a Service Mesh (e.g., Istio) provides mutual TLS (mTLS) for encrypted communication and cryptographic identity verification between services.

Security gates are checkpoints placed at the end of SDLC phases to verify that security requirements have been satisfied before proceeding to the next stage.

The ISSMP must perform a 'Third-Party Risk Assessment' (TPRA) that evaluates the vendor's security controls, such as their SOC2 Type II report or ISO 27001 certification, to ensure the integration does not violate company security standards.

The ISSMP should implement a 'break-glass' access policy where developers can request temporary, audited access via a tool like HashiCorp Boundary or AWS IAM Identity Center, rather than having persistent standing access.

Decommissioning in the cloud involves ensuring data is wiped, access rights are removed, and the resources are actually terminated to prevent billing and security exposure.

The CAB's primary role is to evaluate the technical and business impact of proposed changes, ensuring that all risks are identified and mitigated before approval.

The most critical step in decommissioning is the secure sanitization (clearing or purging) of storage media according to industry standards (e.g., NIST SP 800-88).

A formal change request must include a 'backout plan' (rollback procedure) to ensure service continuity if the change fails or causes unexpected issues.

The ISSMP should ensure security requirements are documented as 'Abuse Cases' or 'Security User Stories' within the existing Agile backlog management tool to maintain traceability.

Failing to integrate security early results in 'bolted-on' security which is often flawed, expensive to fix, and leaves the system vulnerable to architectural design defects.

The System Security Plan (SSP) is the foundational document that defines the security controls selected and implemented for a system.

A secure SDLC requires both proactive security requirements (Threat Modeling) and detective security validation (Automated Testing) to be integrated into the process.

Preventing IDOR requires both server-side authorization checks and the use of indirect/randomized identifiers rather than sequential, predictable keys.

Using Kubernetes 'Admission Controllers' (e.g., OPA Gatekeeper) allows the enforcement of security policies (such as preventing privilege escalation) consistently across all deployments.

Integrating static analysis tools for IaC (like 'tfsec' or 'Checkov') into the pipeline identifies insecure configurations before the 'terraform apply' command is executed.

Code signing (e.g., using Sigstore or GPG) ensures the integrity of artifacts from build to deployment, ensuring that only signed/authorized code reaches production.

Supply chain security is best achieved by signing artifacts to prevent tampering and using vulnerability scanners to detect known issues in third-party dependencies.

Security integration requires SAST (Static Application Security Testing) to be performed during the development phase, specifically as part of the commit or build process.

Separation of duties requires that the person who develops the change (DBA) is different from the person who approves the change (Change Manager) and the person who performs the production deployment (Release Engineer).

Requirements must include authentication, authorization, and data encryption standards to ensure the application is secure by design.

Threat modeling is most effective during the design phase because it allows architects to identify and mitigate design-level security flaws before implementation begins.

Production gates check for vulnerability remediation, passing functional/security tests, and the presence of required documentation (like the change request).

The ISSMP must initiate a formal Risk Acceptance process, requiring the business owner to acknowledge the residual risk and documenting it in the risk register.

A change log must include the final outcome (status) and the timestamp to ensure traceability and audit accuracy.

The 'Vulnerability Density' (vulnerabilities per KLOC) or 'Mean Time to Remediation' (MTTR) are the most effective metrics for demonstrating SDLC security health.