SC-900 Practice Question: Describe the concepts of security, compliance, and identity
A security administrator receives an alert from Microsoft Sentinel about a possible brute-force attack against a virtual machine. The administrator wants to automatically block the attacker's IP address for 24 hours using a playbook. Which automation trigger should the playbook use?
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
✓
Incident trigger
An incident trigger allows the playbook to run automatically when a new incident is created in Microsoft Sentinel. In this scenario, the alert about the brute-force attack generates an incident, and the playbook can then block the attacker's IP address for 24 hours. Option B (Alert trigger) runs on alert generation, but the administrator wants to respond to the incident for a coordinated response. Option C (Scheduled trigger) runs on a timer and is not event-driven. Option D (Action trigger) is not a valid trigger type in Microsoft Sentinel.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Incident trigger
Why this is correct
An incident trigger fires the playbook automatically when Microsoft Sentinel creates the incident, letting the logic app act without manual intervention. This satisfies the requirement to block the attacker's IP for 24 hours automatically, since the playbook runs on incident creation rather than on a schedule or alert.
- ✗
Alert trigger
Why it's wrong here
An alert trigger fires when a Microsoft Sentinel alert is created, but the requirement is to block the IP automatically as part of incident response, which the incident trigger handles by running the playbook on incident creation. Alert triggers suit playbooks reacting to individual alerts without incident grouping.
- ✗
Scheduled trigger
Why it's wrong here
A scheduled trigger runs the playbook at fixed times, so it cannot react to the Sentinel incident and block the address promptly. Scheduled playbooks suit recurring maintenance tasks; incident-triggered automation, which fires when the alert is created, is required to block the attacker's IP for 24 hours.
- ✗
Action trigger
Why it's wrong here
An action trigger fires when a specific action is taken, not when an alert is raised, so it cannot initiate the playbook from the Sentinel incident itself. It suits scenarios where a playbook runs on demand or from a manual action within an incident, rather than automatic alert-driven response.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Azure NSG and Application Security Groups
Key term
Incident
An incident is a security event that violates an organization's policies or threatens its data, systems, or operations, requiring a structured response.
Key term
Microsoft Sentinel
Microsoft Sentinel is a cloud-native security information and event management (SIEM) and security orchestration automation and response (SOAR) service that helps organizations detect, investigate, and respond to cyber threats across their entire digital estate.
About these practice questions
Courseiva writes every SC-900 question from scratch — 1,279 in total, each with an explanation and a wrong-answer breakdown. None are copied from real exams or dumps. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This SC-900 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Microsoft 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 SC-900 exam.