CCSP Cloud Concepts, Architecture, and Design Practice Question
A cloud architect is designing a system that must survive the failure of an entire cloud provider region. The application uses a relational database and object storage. Which design approach BEST achieves regional fault tolerance while minimizing data loss and operational complexity?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap here is treating multi-availability-zone redundancy inside one region as equivalent to regional fault tolerance.
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
✓
Deploy the application in two regions with asynchronous database replication and cross-region replication for object storage, then use DNS failover to redirect traffic.
Surviving a full region failure requires resources and data in at least two independent regions. Asynchronous database replication avoids the latency and availability penalties of synchronous cross-region writes, cross-region object storage replication protects unstructured data, and DNS failover provides a practical traffic redirection mechanism with acceptable recovery time objectives.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Deploy the application in a single region with a multi-master database cluster spanning three availability zones and global load balancing.
Why it's wrong here
A multi-master cluster across availability zones improves local resilience and write availability, but all nodes remain inside one region. A region-level event such as a natural disaster or provider-wide control plane failure would take down every availability zone and the global load balancer's origin pool, so regional fault tolerance is not achieved.
- ✗
Deploy the application in two availability zones within a single region and rely on the provider's managed backup service for the database.
Why it's wrong here
Two availability zones protect against a single data center failure but not against a full region outage. Managed backups may also reside in the same region, so a regional disaster could affect both the application and its recovery data. This approach does not meet the requirement to survive the loss of an entire provider region.
- ✗
Deploy the application in two regions using synchronous database replication and a single object storage bucket with cross-region access.
Why it's wrong here
Synchronous cross-region replication imposes high write latency and can fail when the inter-region link degrades, risking availability. A single object storage bucket does not provide regional redundancy for the data itself. This combination increases operational fragility rather than delivering reliable regional fault tolerance.
- ✓
Deploy the application in two regions with asynchronous database replication and cross-region replication for object storage, then use DNS failover to redirect traffic.
Why this is correct
This design places the application in two independent regions, replicates the database asynchronously to bound latency impact, replicates object storage across regions, and uses DNS failover to shift traffic. It directly addresses a full region outage while keeping operational complexity manageable compared with active-active multi-master database designs.
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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 CCSP 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 CCSP exam.