PCNSE Secure Access and VPN Practice Question
A remote user's GlobalProtect client disconnects every 10 minutes. What setting should the administrator check?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often confuse the reconnection interval (which controls reconnection attempts after a failure) with the ping interval (which controls keepalive pings to prevent failure), leading them to select Option A instead of the correct gateway-level keepalive setting.
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
✓
The ping interval on the gateway.
The GlobalProtect client uses a keepalive mechanism to maintain the VPN tunnel. The ping interval on the gateway determines how often the client sends ICMP echo requests to the gateway to verify connectivity. If the ping interval is set too high or the client fails to receive responses within the configured timeout, the client may interpret the connection as lost and disconnect. A 10-minute disconnection pattern strongly suggests the ping interval or related timeout is misconfigured, causing the client to drop the tunnel after a period of inactivity.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
The reconnection interval on the portal.
Why it's wrong here
Incorrect. Reconnection interval affects how quickly client retries, not disconnection.
- ✗
The idle timeout on the authentication profile.
Why it's wrong here
Incorrect. Idle timeout affects user session, not VPN tunnel.
- ✓
The ping interval on the gateway.
Why this is correct
Correct. Gateway ping interval defines how often keepalives are sent.
- ✗
The UDP checksum offloading on the client.
Why it's wrong here
Incorrect. Checksum offloading causes packet corruption, not periodic disconnects.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This PCNSE practice question is part of Courseiva's free Palo Alto Networks 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 PCNSE exam.