Question 1hardmultiple choice
Full question →hardmultiple choiceObjective-mapped
Three Azure VMs in separate resource groups run the same data-processing agent. The agent must read blobs from a storage account, and the access must continue to work if any VM is rebuilt or replaced. The operations team also wants one identity they can reassign to future VMs without creating another credential. Which identity approach should be used?
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Good practice is not just finding the correct option. The wrong answers often show the exact trap the exam wants you to fall into.
A
Distractor review
A system-assigned managed identity on each VM.
System-assigned managed identities are tied to an individual VM resource. They disappear when that VM is deleted and cannot be directly reused by future VMs, which makes them a poor fit for shared identity reuse.
B
Distractor review
A storage account shared key embedded in the application settings.
A shared key provides access, but it is a secret that must be stored, protected, and rotated. It does not meet the requirement to avoid credentials and does not provide a reusable Azure identity.
C
Distractor review
A service principal credential stored in a Key Vault secret.
A service principal can authenticate, but it still relies on a secret or certificate that must be managed. The requirement specifically asks for an identity that can be reused across VMs without creating another credential.
D
Best answer
A user-assigned managed identity attached to the VMs.
A user-assigned managed identity is the right choice when the same Azure identity must be shared across multiple VMs and survive VM replacement. You can grant it access once, attach it to current and future VMs, and avoid storing passwords or access keys in the workload.
Common exam trap
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
Many certification questions include familiar terms but test a specific constraint. Read the exact wording before choosing an answer that is generally true but wrong for this case.
Technical deep dive
How to think about this question
This question should be treated as a scenario, not a definition check. Identify the problem, the constraint and the best action. Then compare each option against those facts.
KKey Concepts to Remember
- Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
- Find the constraint that changes the correct option.
- Eliminate answers that are true in general but not in this case.
- Use explanations to understand the rule behind the answer.
TExam Day Tips
- Underline the problem statement mentally.
- Watch for words such as best, first, most likely and least administrative effort.
- Review why wrong options are wrong, not only why the correct option is correct.
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More questions from this exam
Keep practising from the same exam bank, or move into a focused topic page if this question exposed a weak area.
Question 1
A route table contains these entries: 10.0.0.0/8 with next hop Virtual appliance, and 10.1.1.0/24 with next hop Virtual network gateway. Which next hop will Azure use for traffic to 10.1.1.5?
Question 2
You are deploying a stateless web application on Azure virtual machines. The solution must automatically add and remove instances based on CPU demand and allow all instances to be managed as one logical group. Which Azure compute feature should you deploy?
Question 3
You are deploying a Windows Server VM for an internal app. The VM must support Secure Boot and vTPM later, its OS disk must survive host moves, and the team wants the lowest-cost managed disk tier that still behaves like a normal writable OS disk. Which two choices should you make? Select two.
Question 4
You need to deploy several identical virtual machines and ensure that the failure of a single Azure host does not affect all of them. Which feature should you use?
Question 5
You need to connect VNet-Hub and VNet-Spoke so that resources in both virtual networks can communicate privately over the Microsoft backbone. Both virtual networks are in the same region. What should you configure?
Question 6
You need to create a storage account that provides the lowest-cost redundant storage for non-critical data and only needs protection against local disk or server failure within a single datacenter. Which redundancy option should you choose?
FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this AZ-104 question test?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: A user-assigned managed identity attached to the VMs. — A user-assigned managed identity is independent of the VM lifecycle, so it can be attached to multiple VMs and kept even if a VM is rebuilt or deleted. That makes it ideal for workloads that need a stable Azure identity and credential-free access to storage or other Azure services. It also simplifies future migrations because the identity remains the same while the compute instances change. Why others are wrong: A system-assigned identity is convenient but is bound to one VM, so it does not satisfy shared reuse. A storage key is a secret and should not be the primary design here. A service principal also introduces credentials, which the scenario explicitly wants to avoid. Only a user-assigned managed identity gives durable, reusable, secretless access across VMs.
What should I do if I get this AZ-104 question wrong?
Then try more questions from the same exam bank and focus on understanding why the wrong options are tempting.
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