Comptia review questions Flashcards
You go out the back door of your building and notice someone looking
through your company’s trash. If this person were trying to acquire sensitive
information, what would this attack be known as?
Dumpster diving
User education can help to defend against which type of attacks?
Social engineering
You can often configure your email servers or email cloud services to add
a message in the email subject line to identify emails that are coming from
outside of the organization. This technique is also known as __________.
Prepending
What is the most common reason that social engineering succeeds?
Lack of user awareness
In which two environments would social engineering attacks be most effective?
A public building with shared office space
What is a social engineering technique used by adversaries that leverages user
errors (“typos”) when entering a given URL in their web browser for a given
website?
Typo squatting
A man pretending to be a data communications repair technician enters your
building and states that there is networking trouble and he needs access to the
server room. What is this an example of?
Social engineering
Turnstiles, double entry doors, and security guards are all preventive measures
for what kind of social engineering?
Tailgating
What is the social engineering technique where the attacker redirects the
victim from a valid website or resource to a malicious one that could be made
to appear as the valid site to the user?
Pharming
Why would you implement password masking and privacy screens/filters?
To deter shoulder surfing
What is a group of compromised computers that have software installed by a
worm or Trojan?
Botnet
What term is often used to describe a compromised system that can be
updated automatically and remotely?
Bot
What is a common symptom of spyware?
Pop-up windows with advertisements
You noticed that your DHCP server is flooded with information. After analyzing this condition, you found that the information is coming from more than
100 computers on the network. What is most likely the reason?
You have been infected with a worm
Which type of malicious software encrypts sensitive files and asks the user to
pay in order to obtain a key recover those files?
Ransomware
What is a malicious attack that executes at the same time every week?
Logic bomb
What is still one of the most common ways that attackers spread ransomware?
Through email
What is a type of malware that appears to a user as legitimate but actually
enables unauthorized access to the user’s computer?
Trojan
What tool is used by many penetration testers, attackers, and even malware
that can be useful for retrieving password hashes from memory?
Mimikatz
What is the act of restructuring driver code called?
Driver refactoring
What type of attack occurs when the attacker performs an MITM attack and
can redirect a client to an insecure HTTP connect?
SSL stripping attack
What is a modern framework of API documentation and development that is
the basis of the OpenAPI Specification (OAS)?
Swagger
What type of attack occurs when a user browsing the web is tricked into clicking something different than what the user thought he or she was clicking?
Clickjacking
What type of attack is difficult to exploit because it takes advantage of the
small window of time between when a service is used and its corresponding
security control is executed in an application, operating system, or when temporary files are created?
Race condition
What feature is supported in most modern operating systems that can help
prevent the exploitation of buffer overflows, remote code execution, and memory corruption vulnerabilities?
Address space layout randomization (ASLR)
What is a type of input validation vulnerability and attack against an application that parses XML input?
XML External Entity (XXE)
What is a Microsoft scripting language that attackers have used to perform
postexploitation activities such as privilege escalation or to enumerate users?
PowerShell
What is a standard that was designed to thwart spammers from spoofing your
domain to send email?
DMARC
What is a web application vulnerability that could allow an attacker to perform
a URL redirection attack?
Cross-site scripting (XSS)
What is the modification of name resolution information that should be in a
DNS server’s cache?
DNS poisoning
In what type of attack does the attacker sniff the network for valid MAC
addresses and then use those MAC addresses to perform other actions?
MAC cloning or spoofing
What includes the tactics and techniques that adversaries use while preparing
for an attack, including gathering of information (open-source intelligence,
technical and people weakness identification, and more)?
MITRE PRE-ATT&CK
What standard was designed to document threat intelligence in a machinereadable format?
STIX
What standard was designed as a transport mechanism of threat intelligence
and to perform automated indicator sharing (AIS)?
TAXII
What is the vulnerability database maintained by NIST?
National Vulnerability Database (NVD)
What is the attack vector where evil twins are used?
Wireless
You were hired to perform a penetration test against three different applications for a large enterprise. You are considered a(n) ______________ hacker.
Authorized or ethical
You are hired to investigate a cyber attack. Your customer provided different
types of information collected from compromised systems such as malware
hashes and the IP address of a potential command and control (C2). What are
these elements often called?
Indicators of compromise (IoCs)
What name is often used to describe a government or state-sponsored
persistent and sophisticated attack?
Advanced persistent threat (APT)
What is the term used when an employee or a group of employees use IT
systems, network devices, software, applications, and services without the
approval of the corporate IT department?
Shadow IT
What software tool or service acts as the gatekeeper between a cloud offering
and the on-premises network, allowing an organization to extend the reach of
its security policies beyond its internal infrastructure?
Cloud access security broker (CASB)
What is the name given to a type of vulnerability that is disclosed by an
individual or exploited by an attacker before the creator of the software can
create a patch to fix the underlying issue?
Zero-day vulnerability
What cloud architecture model is a mix of public and private, but one where
multiple organizations can share the public portion?
Community cloud
What type of vulnerability occurs when an attacker obtains control of a target
computer through some sort of vulnerability, gaining the power to execute
commands on that remote computer?
Remote code execution (RCE)
What protocol uses TCP ports 465 or 587 in most cases?
SMTP with TLS encryption
What type of vulnerability scanner can be used to assess vulnerable web
services?
A web application vulnerability scanner
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What documents do vendors, vulnerability coordination centers, and security
researchers publish to disclose security vulnerabilities?
Security advisories and bulletins
What term is used to describe an organization that can assign CVEs to
vulnerabilities?
CVE Numbering Authorities (CNAs)
What public database can anyone use to obtain information about security
vulnerabilities affecting software and hardware products?
National Vulnerability Database (NVD)
How many score “groups” are supported in CVSS?
Three
A vulnerability with a CVSS score of 4.9 is considered a ___________ severity
vulnerability.
Medium
What is the process of iteratively looking for threats that may have bypassed
your security controls?
Threat hunting
You were hired to perform a penetration test against a set of applications. After
the exploitation phase, you need to maintain a foothold in a compromised
system to perform additional tasks such as installing and/or modifying services
to connect back to the compromised system. This process is referred to as
_____________.
Persistence
What is the process of elevating the level of authority (privileges) of a
compromised user or a compromised application?
Privilege escalation
What is the term used to define the type of testing where the penetration
testers may be provided credentials but not full documentation of the network
infrastructure?
Partially known environment
What is the term used when an organization provides recognition or
compensation to security researchers and ethical hackers who report security
vulnerabilities or bugs? Often organizations can use brokers and companies
that manage the compensation and communication with the security
researchers.
Bug bounties
OSINT is used in the ________ reconnaissance phase of the penetration
testing lifecycle.
Passive
In the context of site resiliency, a ________ will have backups of data that
might need to be restored; they will probably be several days old. This type
of site is chosen most often by organizations because it has a good amount of
configuration yet remains less expensive than a hot site
Warm site
What can be used as bait files intended to lure adversaries to access and then
send alarms to security analysts for detection?
Honeyfiles
What is the name given to a set of access control technologies that are used to
control the use of proprietary hardware, software, and copyrighted works?
Digital rights management (DRM)
What term is used when data is actively used and undergoing constant
change? For instance, data could be stored in databases or spreadsheets and be
processed by running applications.
Data in use/processing
What is the process of generating a random value for plaintext data and
storing the mapping in a database?
Tokenization
What system can be used to interconnect a virtual private cloud (VPC) and
on-premises networks?
Transit gateway
___________ are used in the process of creating, assigning, and managing rules
over the cloud resources that systems (virtual machines, containers, and so on)
or applications use.
Resource policies
What is a series of tools and technologies used to connect different systems,
applications, code repositories, and physical or virtual network infrastructure
to allow the real-time exchange of data and processes?
Cloud services integration
AWS Lambda is an example of which type of cloud service architecture?
Serverless architecture
OpenDaylight (ODL) is an example of a(n) _________ controller.
SDN
What type of debugging is carried out by examining the code without executing the program? It can be done by scrutinizing code visually, or with the aid
of specific automated tools—static code analyzers—based on the language
being used
Static analysis
What is the process of measuring your source code’s quality when it is passed
on to the quality assessment (QA)?
Software integrity measurement
What is the software development environment where you create your code
on your computer or in the cloud?
Development
What is a development environment that allows you to test your code or application but is as similar to the production environment as it can be? This environment allows you to ensure that each component of your application still
does its job with everything else going on around it.
. Staging
What is a software development and project management process where a
project is managed by breaking it up into several stages and involving constant
collaboration with stakeholders and continuous improvement and iteration at
every stage?
Agile
What can replicate data widely to increase availability and reliability and thus
reduce response time?
Directory services
What directory service operation targets a specific, unique entry, such as a
domain name?
Lookup
What is the process where one system is responsible for authentication of a
user and provides that information to another resource as authenticated?
Federation
Which biometric method uses blood vessel patterns as a personal identifying
factor?
Vein or vein authentication
What is the study of a human motion, body mechanics, and activity of the
muscles?
Gait analysis
What is the point where the false rejection rate (FRR) and the false acceptance
rate (FAR) are equal?
The crossover error rate (CER) describes the point where the false rejection
rate (FRR) and false acceptance rate (FAR) are equal. The crossover error rate
describes the overall accuracy of a biometric system.
What is geographical dispersal?
Geographical dispersal is the practice of placing valuable data assets around
the city, state, country, or world to provide an extra level of protection from
attacks, mistakes, and disasters.
What is disk redundancy?
In the simplest of terms, disk redundancy is a system’s ability to write data to
two or more disks at the same time. Having the same data stored on separate
disks enables you to recover the data in the event of a disk failure.
What is a UPS?
An uninterruptible power supply or uninterruptible power source (UPS) is
an electrical device that provides emergency power to a load when the input
power source or mains power fails. Generally, UPSs are battery based—a bank
of batteries and circuits that provide power during main power failure.
What is replication?
Data replication via a SAN is the most common method of replication. Replicating data from one data center to another via dual SANs allows you to replicate large volumes of data quickly using SAN technology
What is reverting to known state?
Reverting to known state is returning the system to a state prior to a specific
moment in time or state of existence.
What is an Arduino device?
Arduino devices are hardware and software combined into an extremely flexible platform; they can read inputs such as a light on a sensor or a button press.
The Arduino software is easy for beginners to use yet flexible enough for
advanced users. It runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux.
What is the purpose of an FPGA?
Field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) are integrated circuits designed to
be configured by a customer or designer after manufacturing—hence the term
field programmable
What systems do the SCADA/ICS control systems actually control in the
manufacturing process?
In the manufacturing process, control systems can help with the reduction of
product errors and discards, due to earlier problem detection and remedies.
These systems improve productivity, maximizing the effectiveness of machine
uptime.
Look around your house. What IoT-related devices do you own? What is the
number one problem with IoT devices being developed and sold?
Cybersecurity and attacks on the platform are the biggest problem with IoT
devices being developed and sold. Cybersecurity must be designed into IoT
devices from the ground up and at all points in the ecosystem to prevent vulnerabilities in one part from jeopardizing the security of the entire system.
Today’s vehicles are mostly computerized. Which protocol/system do most
vehicles use for ECU to communicate between themselves?
The CAN bus system enables each ECU to communicate with all other
ECUs, without complex dedicated wiring. An ECU can prepare and broadcast
information (that is, sensor data) via the CAN bus, consisting of two wires—
CAN low and CAN high. The broadcasted data is accepted by all other ECUs
on the CAN network.
What are badges used for in physical security controls?
An access badge is a credential used to gain entry to an area having automated
readers for access control entry points
What purpose does signage serve in controlling security in a building or
factory?
Appropriately placed signage provides direction and guidance for staff and
visitors; it also provides clear expectations and the repercussions for failure to
abide by those rules.
What does industrial camouflage accomplish in today’s business and industrial
environment?
It enables corporate, industrial, and data centers to blend into their environment. When you surround the premises with trees, bushes, and vegetation and
implement low-profile security measures around the perimeter, the building
becomes one with the area. This ensures it does not stick out and become a
highly visible target.
How does two-person integrity/control ensure systems and corporate data
integrity are accomplished?
One of the two people is there as an observer; this person monitors the person
performing the work and ensures that person is performing work exactly as
described in the change request and can also question any variance. The monitor typically reports any unusual or suspicious activity immediately to security
or the guards’ office.
What sensors provide access to an area?
A proximity reader or prox reader, typically an RFID reader, reads a card by
placing it near (within proximity of) the reader. The reader sends energy in the
form of a field to the card, powering up the card, which enables the reader to
read the information stored on the prox card. Prox cards are used as part of an
access control system.
Digital signatures employ which stream type?
Digital signatures employ asymmetric cryptography. In many instances, they
provide a layer of validation and security to messages sent through a nonsecure
channel. Properly implemented, a digital signature gives the receiver reason to
believe the message was sent by the claimed sender
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What are key stretching techniques used for?
Key stretching techniques are used to make a possibly weak key, typically a password or passphrase, more secure against brute-force attacks by increasing the resources (time and possibly space) needed to test each possible key
What does salting passwords protect against?
Salts defend against a precomputed hash attack. Because salts are different in
each case, they also protect commonly used passwords, or those users who use
the same password on several sites, by making all salted hash instances for the
same password different from each other.
