CCSP Legal, Risk, and Compliance Practice Question
A company needs to export data from a cloud service in a machine-readable format to comply with a data subject's right to data portability under GDPR. Which format is most appropriate?
⚠ Common exam trap
Watch out — candidates often confuse 'human-readable' with 'machine-readable' — PDF and HTML look readable to a person but fail GDPR's structured, machine-parseable requirement.
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
✓
CSV (Comma-Separated Values)
GDPR Article 20 grants data subjects the right to receive their personal data in a 'structured, commonly used and machine-readable format.' CSV satisfies all three criteria: it is structured (tabular rows/columns), widely used, and easily parsed by software. It also supports transmission to another controller without hindrance, which is the core purpose of portability.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
HTML
Why it's wrong here
HTML mixes presentation markup with data, so automated parsing is unreliable and portability obligations are not met. It is tempting because HTML is human-readable and commonly used for web exports, but it would suit a display-oriented report, not a structured machine-readable transfer.
- ✗
PDF
Why it's wrong here
PDF is a fixed-layout presentation format, so its internal structure cannot be reliably parsed into discrete field values for portability. It tempts because PDFs suit human-readable reports and signed records. Machine-readable portability demands a structured serialisation such as JSON or CSV, which preserves field names and values for transfer.
- ✓
CSV (Comma-Separated Values)
Why this is correct
CSV is machine-readable and commonly used for data portability.
- ✗
JPEG
Why it's wrong here
JPEG is a lossy image compression format and cannot represent structured personal data fields for portability. It is tempting because it is a widely supported, portable file type, but that portability concerns images; a data subject's records require a structured format such as JSON or CSV.
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.