ISC2 CC Security Principles Practice Question
An organization uses hashing to ensure that data has not been altered during transmission. Which security principle is being implemented?
⚠ Common exam trap
Watch out — candidates often confuse integrity with authentication or confidentiality; candidates often think hashing provides authentication because it verifies data, but it only ensures the data hasn't changed, not who sent it.
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
✓
Integrity
Hashing produces a fixed-length digest that acts as a fingerprint of the data. If even a single bit changes during transmission, the resulting hash will differ, allowing the receiver to detect any alteration. This directly enforces the security principle of integrity, which ensures data is not modified in an unauthorized or accidental manner.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
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Availability
Why it's wrong here
Hashing verifies integrity, not uptime or service reachability, so availability is untouched by detecting altered data. Availability is tempting because it is a core CIA triad principle, and it would be the answer if the scenario concerned redundancy, failover or denial-of-service resilience rather than tamper detection.
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Authentication
Why it's wrong here
A hash digest confirms the data arrived unmodified; it does not verify the sender's identity, which requires credentials, certificates or a MAC. Authentication is tempting because hashing underpins password storage and HMAC, and it would be correct if the stem asked how a recipient proves who sent a message.
- ✓
Integrity
Why this is correct
Hashing produces a fixed-length digest from the transmitted data; any modification changes the digest, so the recipient can verify the data arrived unaltered. This directly satisfies the requirement to detect alteration during transmission, which is the integrity principle.
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Confidentiality
Why it's wrong here
Hashing verifies integrity, detecting alteration, not confidentiality, which requires encryption restricting who can read data. It is tempting because hashing is a cryptographic control often grouped with encryption, and would be the right principle when protecting stored passwords or preventing unauthorised disclosure.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Key term
Integrity
Integrity is the assurance that data has not been altered or tampered with in an unauthorized way, preserving its accuracy and consistency from source to destination.
Key term
Organization
An Organization is a top-level container in Google Cloud that represents your company or entities and serves as the root node for all your cloud resources, policies, and access control.
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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 ISC2 exam blueprint
This CC practice question is part of Courseiva's free ISC2 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 CC exam.