CCSP Legal, Risk, and Compliance Practice Question
A cloud customer is assessing the risk of using a cloud provider. Which THREE factors are most important in evaluating the inherent risk of migrating data and applications to the cloud?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap is selecting provider certifications or physical security as 'inherent risk' factors; candidates must distinguish inherent risks (introduced by the cloud model) from mitigating controls or assurances that reduce risk.
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
✓
Data leaving the customer's direct control and being stored on shared infrastructure
Option A is correct because migrating to the cloud inherently means data leaves the customer's direct physical and logical control and resides on multi-tenant shared infrastructure, which is a fundamental source of inherent risk regardless of any controls the provider implements. Option B is correct because the customer becomes dependent on the provider's security controls, and a provider-side breach or compromise can affect multiple tenants simultaneously, creating concentration and supply-chain risk that the customer cannot fully mitigate alone. Option D is correct because the shared responsibility model defines which security duties remain with the customer, and customer-side misconfiguration (for example, an exposed S3 bucket or overly permissive IAM role) is a leading cause of cloud incidents, making it a core inherent risk factor. Option C is not selected because compliance certifications are assurance artifacts that help evaluate the provider's control environment rather than inherent risk factors of the migration itself. Option E is not selected because the provider's physical data center security is a control the provider manages and is largely inherited by the customer, so it is not one of the most important inherent risk factors in this assessment.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Data leaving the customer's direct control and being stored on shared infrastructure
Why this is correct
Data leaving direct control removes the customer's ability to enforce physical and logical safeguards, while shared infrastructure introduces multi-tenancy risks such as side-channel exposure and noisy-neighbour contention. These are inherent to cloud migration, satisfying the stem's focus on risks arising from the provider's model rather than contractual or operational controls.
- ✓
Dependence on the provider's security controls and the risk of a provider-side breach affecting multiple tenants
Why this is correct
Dependence on provider security controls directly addresses the loss-of-control inherent in cloud migration, while multi-tenancy creates shared-fate risk: a provider-side breach or control failure can compromise many customers simultaneously. This satisfies the stem's inherent-risk focus, since these exposures arise from the cloud delivery model itself rather than the customer's own safeguards.
- ✗
The provider's compliance certifications (e.g., ISO 27001, SOC 2)
Why it's wrong here
Compliance certifications evidence the provider's control environment but are assurance artefacts, not inherent risk factors; they reduce assessed risk rather than define it. Certifications are the correct focus when selecting a provider or validating controls, whereas inherent risk concerns data sensitivity, exposure and dependency.
- ✓
The shared responsibility model and potential for misconfiguration by the customer
Why this is correct
The shared responsibility model defines which security controls the provider owns and which the customer must implement; customer-side misconfiguration is a leading inherent risk in cloud breaches. This factor directly addresses the risk assessment's need to evaluate control gaps arising from the division of duties.
- ✗
The provider's physical security controls at data centers
Why it's wrong here
Physical data-centre controls address only one layer of provider risk, whereas inherent risk assessment centres on data residency, multi-tenancy, and shared responsibility gaps. It tempts because physical security is a genuine due-diligence artefact when auditing a provider's facilities directly, but it does not evaluate the migration risk itself.
Quick reference
AWS S3 Storage Class Comparison
| Storage Class | Min Duration | Retrieval | Use Case |
|---|---|---|---|
| S3 Standard | None | Immediate | Frequently accessed data |
| S3 Standard-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Infrequent access, rapid retrieval |
| S3 One Zone-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Non-critical infrequent data |
| S3 Intelligent-Tiering | None | Immediate–hours | Unknown or changing access patterns |
| S3 Glacier Instant | 90 days | Milliseconds | Archive with instant retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Flexible | 90 days | Minutes–hours | Archive, flexible retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Deep Archive | 180 days | Hours | Long-term compliance archive |
Go deeper
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About these practice questions
This CCSP question is part of Courseiva's 934-question bank — original exam-style content with full explanations and wrong-answer analysis, never real exam questions or exam dumps. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
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.