AZ-400 Develop a security and compliance plan Practice Question
This AZ-400 practice question tests your understanding of develop a security and compliance plan. Match the stated requirement to the specific cloud service, access model, or configuration option — many options are valid in isolation but not for this scenario. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
Which TWO actions should a DevOps engineer take to ensure that Azure DevOps pipelines comply with the principle of least privilege for service connections?
Clue words in this question
Noticing these words before you look at the options changes how you read each choice.
Clue: "least"
Why it matters: You want the option with minimum overhead, fewest steps, or lowest impact — not the most feature-rich or comprehensive answer.
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Create a service principal with permissions scoped to the minimum required Azure resources.
Option A is correct because creating a service principal with permissions scoped to the minimum required Azure resources directly implements the principle of least privilege. By assigning only the necessary roles (e.g., Contributor on a specific resource group) to the service principal used in the service connection, you ensure that the pipeline can only perform actions on those resources, reducing the attack surface. This aligns with Azure RBAC best practices for securing automated deployments.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
✓
Create a service principal with permissions scoped to the minimum required Azure resources.
Why this is correct
Scoped permissions enforce least privilege.
Clue confirmation
The clue word "least" in the question point toward this answer.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
✗
Use the Project Collection Build Service account for all pipeline runs.
Why it's wrong here
This account has elevated permissions across all projects.
✗
Use Workload identity federation to avoid managing secrets.
Why it's wrong here
This is a credential management improvement, not directly about least privilege.
✓
Configure the service connection to be available only to specific pipelines.
Why this is correct
Restricting usage to specific pipelines reduces exposure.
Clue confirmation
The clue word "least" in the question point toward this answer.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
✗
Use the same service connection for both build and release pipelines.
Why it's wrong here
Sharing a connection may grant more permissions than needed.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
The trap here is that candidates often confuse 'Workload identity federation' (which improves secret management) with 'least privilege' (which is about permission scoping), leading them to select option C instead of recognizing that federation does not automatically restrict permissions.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
Under the hood, Azure DevOps service connections store a service principal's credentials (client ID and secret) or use federated tokens. When a pipeline runs, it authenticates as that service principal to Azure Resource Manager. Scoping the service principal via Azure RBAC (e.g., assigning the 'Reader' role on a specific storage account) ensures that even if the connection is compromised, the attacker can only access that resource. In a real-world scenario, a build pipeline that only needs to read source code from a storage account should not have Contributor access to a production database; using separate, scoped service principals for each pipeline enforces this boundary.
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.
TExam Day Tips
→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.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
How this comes up in practice
A company's IT admin needs to give a contractor read-only access to production logs without sharing account credentials. Using role-based access control (RBAC) and temporary scoped permissions — not a permanent shared password — is the correct pattern. Questions like this test whether you can apply least-privilege access across cloud identity services.
Related glossary terms
Concepts from this question explained
These glossary pages explain the core terms tested in this AZ-400 question in full detail.
Develop a security and compliance plan — This question tests Develop a security and compliance plan — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Create a service principal with permissions scoped to the minimum required Azure resources. — Option A is correct because creating a service principal with permissions scoped to the minimum required Azure resources directly implements the principle of least privilege. By assigning only the necessary roles (e.g., Contributor on a specific resource group) to the service principal used in the service connection, you ensure that the pipeline can only perform actions on those resources, reducing the attack surface. This aligns with Azure RBAC best practices for securing automated deployments.
What should I do if I get this AZ-400 question wrong?
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
Are there clue words in this question I should notice?
Yes — watch for: "least". You want the option with minimum overhead, fewest steps, or lowest impact — not the most feature-rich or comprehensive answer.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
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Question Discussion
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