CLF-C02 AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner Questions and Answers

AWS CloudFormation is a service that allows developers to model and provision their AWS infrastructure in a repeatable and declarative way, using code and templates. AWS CloudFormation enables developers to define the resources they need for their development and production environments, such as compute, storage, network, and application services, and automate their creation and configuration. AWS CloudFormation also provides features such as change sets, nested stacks, and rollback triggers to help developers manage and update their infrastructure safely and efficiently12. References:

AWS CloudFormation

What is AWS CloudFormation?

AWS IAM Identity Center (AWS Single Sign-On) is a cloud-based service that makes it easy to centrally manage single sign-on (SSO) access to multiple AWS accounts and business applications. You can use AWS SSO to enable your users to sign in to the AWS Management Console or the AWS Command Line Interface (AWS CLI) with their existing corporate credentials2. You can also manage SSO access and user permissions across all your AWS accounts in AWS Organizations3. References: AWS Single Sign-On - AWS Documentation, AWS Organizations - AWS Documentation

AWS KMS is the service that is used to provide encryption for Amazon EBS. AWS KMS is a managed service that enables you to easily create and control the encryption keys used to encrypt your data.Amazon EBS uses AWS KMS to encrypt and decrypt your EBS volumes and snapshots. You can choose to use either the default AWS managed CMK or your own customer managed CMK for encryption. AWS KMS also provides features such as key rotation, audit logging, and access control policies to help you manage your encryption keys and protect your data12. The other services are not used to provide encryption for Amazon EBS. AWS Certificate Manager is a service that lets you provision, manage, and deploy public and private SSL/TLScertificates for use with AWS services and your internal connected resources3. AWS Systems Manager is a service that provides a unified user interface to view and manage your AWS resources, automate common operational tasks, and apply compliance policies4. AWS Config is a service that enables you to assess, audit, and evaluate the configurations of your AWS resources. References: Amazon EBS encryption, AWS Key Management Service, AWS Certificate Manager, AWS Systems Manager, [AWS Config]

Amazon FSx for Windows File Server is a fully managed file server that supports Microsoft workloads and file systems, including the SMB protocol. It provides features such as user quotas, end-user file restore, and Microsoft Active Directory integration. Amazon EFS is a fully managed file system that supports the NFS protocol, not SMB. Amazon FSx for Lustre is a fully managed file system that supports high-performance computing workloads, not Microsoft workloads. Amazon EBS is a block storage service that does not provide a file system or SMB support. References: Amazon FSx for Windows File Server, Amazon FSx for Lustre, Amazon EFS, Amazon EBS

AWS Secrets Manageris the most secure way to store and manage sensitive information, such as passwords, database credentials, and API keys. Secrets Manager allows you to:

Securely store and rotate secrets.

Automatically manage secret rotation without disrupting applications.

Integrate with AWS services and third-party applications to retrieve secrets securely.

Why other options are not suitable:

A. Store passwords in an Amazon S3 bucket: Although S3 is secure, it is not designed for secret management. It lacks built-in secret rotation and fine-grained access control for sensitive data.

B. Store passwords as AWS CloudFormation parameters: CloudFormation is used for managing infrastructure as code, not for securely storing passwords.

C. Store passwords in AWS Storage Gateway: A service for hybrid storage integration, not suitable for storing secrets or passwords.

Elasticity is a characteristic of the AWS Cloud that helps users eliminate underutilized CPU capacity. Elasticity refers to the ability to dynamically provision and de-provision computing resources as per demand, ensuring that the application or service always has the required resources to operate efficiently. Elasticity helps users optimize performance and costs, as theyonly pay for the resources they use and avoid wasting resources when the demand is low345. References: 3: Which characteristic of the aws cloud helps users eliminate …, 4: AWS Elastic Load Balancing and Application Load Balancer, 5: Which characteristic of the AWS Cloud helps users eliminate …

AWS Global Accelerator is a service that improves network performance by sending traffic through the AWS worldwide network infrastructure. It uses the AWS global network to direct TCP or UDP traffic to a healthy application endpoint in the closest AWS Region to the client. This provides improvements in terms of latency, throughput, and jitter. Global Accelerator also introduces features such as TCP termination at the edge, jumbo frame support, and large receive side window and TCP buffers to optimize data transfer12. Route table, AWS Transit Gateway, and Amazon VPC are not services or features that improve network performance by sending traffic through the AWS worldwide network infrastructure. Route table is a resource that defines how traffic is routed within a VPC3. AWS Transit Gateway is a service that enables you to connect your VPCs and on-premises networks to a single gateway4. Amazon VPC is a service that lets you provision a logically isolated section of the AWS Cloud where you can launch AWS resources in a virtual network that you define5. References: Achieve up to 60% better performance for internet traffic with AWS Global Accelerator, Improving Performance on AWS and Hybrid Networks, Route tables, AWS Transit Gateway, Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC)

AWS Direct Connectis a cloud service solution that makes it easy to establish a dedicated network connection from your premises to AWS. This requires the use of an Internet Service Provider (ISP) and a colocation facility to connect to the Direct Connect location. It provides a private, high-speed, low-latency connection that does not go over the public internet.

A. AWS VPN: Incorrect, as AWS VPN establishes secure connections over the internet and does not necessarily require a colocation facility.

B. Amazon Connect: Incorrect, as it is a cloud-based contact center service.

D. Internet Gateway: Incorrect, as it is a horizontally scaled, redundant, and highly available VPC component that allows communication between instances in your VPC and the internet.

AWS Cloud References:

AWS Direct Connect

Loose coupling is a design principle that involves reducing dependencies between application components so that they can operate independently. This approach ensures that the failure of one component does not affect the availability of the others, thereby improving the application's fault tolerance and resilience. Disposable resources, automation, and rightsizing are valuable principles in cloud architecture, but they do not directly address the requirement of remaining available despite the failure of an individual component like loose coupling does.

AWS SDKs are a set of tools that allow users to connect with AWS and deploy resources programmatically. AWS SDKs provide libraries, code samples, documentation, and other resources to help users write code that interacts with AWS APIs. AWS SDKs support various programming languages, such as Java, Python, Ruby, .NET, Node.js, Go, and more. AWS SDKs make it easier for users to access AWS services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon EC2, Amazon DynamoDB, AWS Lambda, and more, from their applications. AWS SDKs also handle tasks such as authentication, error handling, retries, and data serialization, so users can focus on their application logic .

The other options are not AWS services or tools that give users the ability to connect with AWS and deploy resources programmatically. Amazon QuickSight is a business intelligence service that lets users create and share interactive dashboards and visualizations1. AWS PrivateLink is a service that enables users to securely access services hosted on AWS in a scalable and cost-effective manner2. AWS Direct Connect is a service that establishes a dedicated network connection between a user’s premises and AWS3.

 Amazon Neptune is a fully managed graph database service on AWS. A graph database is a type of database that stores and queries data as a network of nodes and edges, representing entities and relationships. Graph databases are useful for applications that deal with highly connected data, such as social networks, recommendation engines, fraud detection, and knowledge graphs45. Amazon Neptune is a fast, reliable, and scalable graph database service that supports two popular graph models: property graphs and RDF. Amazon Neptune also supports two open standards for querying graphs: Apache TinkerPop Gremlin and SPARQL. Amazon Neptune handles the heavy lifting of managing the database, such as provisioning, patching, backup, recovery, encryption, and replication456. References: 4: Managed Graph Database - Amazon Neptune - AWS, 5: Amazon Neptune – A Fully Managed Graph Database Service, 6: Working with AWS Neptune. Neptune is a fully-managed graph … - Medium

Amazon Route 53 is a highly available and scalable Domain Name System (DNS) web service that can route internet traffic to the company’s ecommerce platform1. Route 53 can also register domain names, check the health of resources, and provide global DNS features2. Route 53 can connect users to the platform by translating human-readable names like www.example.com into the numeric IP addresses that computers use to communicate witheach other2. References: 1: Amazon Route 53 | DNS Service | AWS; 2: What is Amazon Route 53? - Amazon Route 53

Understanding Amazon Snowball Edge: Amazon Snowball Edge is a data migration and edge computing device that helps in transferring large amounts of data to and from AWS.

No-Cost Activities:

Transfer into S3: AWS does not charge for transferring data from the Snowball Edge device into Amazon S3. This is part of the service to facilitate easy data migration into the AWS cloud.

Other Costs: The use of the Snowball Edge appliance for up to 10 days is included in the service fee. However, any usage beyond the 10-day period may incur additional costs.

How to Utilize Snowball Edge:

Order the Device: Use the AWS Management Console to order a Snowball Edge device.

Load Data: Transfer your data onto the Snowball Edge appliance.

Ship Back: Ship the device back to AWS, where the data will be uploaded to Amazon S3 at no additional cost.

Amazon Snowball Edge Pricing

Amazon Snowball Edge Documentation

The correct answers are A and D because network infrastructure and virtualization of infrastructure and physical security of hardware are AWS responsibilities according to the AWS shared responsibility model. The AWS shared responsibility model is a framework that defines the division of responsibilities between AWS and the customer for security and compliance. AWS is responsible for the security of the cloud, which includes the global infrastructure, such as the regions, availability zones, and edge locations; the hardware, software, networking, and facilities that run the AWS services; and the virtualization layer that separates the customer instances and storage. The customer is responsible for the security in the cloud, which includes the customer data, the guest operating systems, the applications, the identity and access management, the firewall configuration, and the encryption. The other options are incorrect because they are not AWS responsibilities according to the AWS shared responsibility model. Security of application data, guest operatingsystems, and credentials and policies are customer responsibilities according to the AWS shared responsibility model. Reference: [AWS Shared Responsibility Model]

According to theAWS Shared Responsibility Model, AWS is responsible for the security "of" the cloud (such as protecting the infrastructure, including hardware, software, networking, and facilities that run AWS Cloud services). In contrast, customers are responsible for security "in" the cloud. This includes configuring and using AWS services securely.

D. Use AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) according to the principle of least privilegeis a customer's responsibility. Customers must manage their credentials, control access to resources, and ensure that IAM policies follow the principle of least privilege, which means granting only the permissions necessary to perform a task.

Why other options are not suitable:

A. Patch the Amazon DynamoDB operating system: AWS is responsible for managing and patching the infrastructure for managed services like DynamoDB.

B. Secure Amazon CloudFront edge locations by allowing physical access according to the principle of least privilege: AWS handles physical security of its edge locations.

C. Protect the hardware that runs AWS services: AWS is responsible for protecting the physical hardware that runs AWS services.

On-Demand Instances are the most cost-efficient pricing model for an uninterruptible workload that runs once a year for 24 hours. On-Demand Instances let you pay for compute capacity by the hour or second, depending on which instances you run. No long-term commitments or up-front payments are required. You can increase or decrease your compute capacity to meet the demands of your application and only pay the specified hourly rates for the instance you use1. This model is suitable for developing/testing applications with short-term or unpredictable workloads2. The other pricing models are not cost-efficient for this use case. Reserved Instances and Savings Plans require a commitment to a consistent amount of usage, in USD per hour, for a term of 1 or 3 years. They provide significant discounts compared to On-Demand Instances, but they are not flexible or scalable for workloads that run only once a year12. Spot Instances are the cheapest option, but they are not suitable for uninterruptible workloads, as they can be reclaimed by AWS at any time. They are recommended for applications that have flexible start and end times, or that are only feasible at very low compute prices12. Dedicated Instances are designed for compliance and licensing requirements, not for cost optimization. They are more expensive than the other options, as they run on single-tenant hardware12. References: Amazon EC2 – Secure and resizable compute capacity – AWS, Amazon EC2 - How AWS Pricing Works

Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS) is a highly scalable, fast container management service that allows you to run, stop, and manage Docker containers on a cluster of Amazon EC2 instances or a serverless environment powered by AWS Fargate. It provides secure, reliable, and scalable operations for containers, allowing users to deploy containers in a highly secure and reliable manner. Amazon Aurora is a relational database service, Amazon Athena is an interactive query service, and Amazon Polly is a text-to-speech service. Therefore, the correct answer is Amazon ECS.

According to the AWS Shared Responsibility Model, AWS is responsible for the security of the cloud, while the customer is responsible for the security in the cloud. This means that AWS is responsible for protecting the infrastructure that runs AWS services, such as DynamoDB, while the customer is responsible for properly configuring the security of the provided service. For abstracted services, such as DynamoDB, the customer is primarily responsible for managing their data, classifying their assets, and using IAM tools to apply the appropriatepermissions12. Therefore, the customer is responsible for controlling the access to DynamoDB tables, such as by creating IAM policies, roles, and users, and using encryption and authentication mechanisms3. References:

Shared Responsibility Model - Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Security and compliance in Amazon DynamoDB - Amazon DynamoDB

What is Shared Responsibility Model? - Check Point Software

Amazon Macie is a data security and privacy service offered by AWS that uses machine learning and pattern matching to discover the sensitive data stored within Amazon S3. You can define your own custom type of sensitive data category that might be unique to your business or use case. Macie also provides you with dashboards and alerts that give you visibility into how your data is being accessed or moved. Macie helps you protect your data by enabling you to apply data protection techniques such as encryption, deletion, access control, and auditing. References: Strengthen the security of sensitive data stored in Amazon S3 by using additional AWS services, Security best practices for Amazon S3, Sensitive Data Protection on AWS, Sensitive Data Protection on Amazon Web Services

AWS CloudFormation is a service that allows you to model and provision your AWS resources using templates. You can define your infrastructure as code and automate the creation and update of your resources. AWS CloudFormation also supports nested stacks, change sets, and rollback features to help you manage complex and dynamic environments34. References:

AWS CloudFormation

AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner Exam Guide

AWS Budgets is a service that allows you to set custom budgets for your AWS costs and usage, and receive alerts via email or Amazon SNS notifications if you exceed or are forecasted to exceed your budgeted amount1. You can create budgets based on different dimensions, such as service, linked account, tag, or purchase option, and define various types of alerts, such as actual, forecasted, or RI utilization alerts2. You can also configure custom actions to automatically execute remediation tasks or workflows when a budget threshold is breached3. AWS Budgets is the only service among the options that can send alerts to customers if custom spending thresholds are exceeded. The other options are not AWS services that provide this functionality.

Reserved Instances and Savings Plans are the most cost-effective purchasing options for a compute workload that is steady, predictable, and uninterruptible. Reserved Instances provide a significant discount compared to On-Demand Instances, and Savings Plans offer flexible and consistent savings on EC2 usage. Both options require a commitment to a consistent amount of usage, in USD per hour, for a term of 1 or 3 years. On-Demand Instances are suitable for short-term, irregular, or unpredictable workloads, but they are more expensive than Reserved Instances or Savings Plans. Spot Instances are the cheapest option, but they are not suitable for uninterruptible workloads, as they can be reclaimed by AWS at any time. Dedicated Hosts and Dedicated Instances are designed for compliance and licensing requirements, not for cost optimization. They are more expensive than the other options, as they run on single-tenant hardware. References: Instance purchasing options, Amazon EC2 Pricing, 4 Ways to Purchase Amazon EC2 Instances

Understanding S3 Intelligent-Tiering: S3 Intelligent-Tiering is designed to optimize costs by automatically moving data to the most cost-effective access tier based on changing access patterns. It is ideal for data with unknown or unpredictable access patterns.

Why S3 Intelligent-Tiering is Cost-Effective:

Automatic Tiering: Moves data between two access tiers (frequent and infrequent access) based on changing access patterns, optimizing storage costs without performance impact.

No Retrieval Fees: Unlike other storage classes, there are no retrieval fees in Intelligent-Tiering, making it cost-effective for data with unpredictable access patterns.

Monitoring and Automation: Automatically monitors access patterns and transitions data, reducing the need for manual intervention.

When to Use S3 Intelligent-Tiering:

Unpredictable Access Patterns: Ideal for datasets where the access frequency cannot be determined or changes frequently.

Cost Optimization: For organizations looking to minimize storage costs without sacrificing performance or requiring manual intervention to move data between tiers.

Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering

Amazon S3 Storage Classes

 IAM roles are a secure way to grant permissions to applications running on an Amazon EC2 instance to make calls to other AWS services. IAM roles are entities that have specific permissions policies attached to them. You can create an IAM role and associate it with an EC2 instance when you launch it or later. The applications on the instance can then use the temporary credentials provided by the role to access AWS resources that the role allows. This way, you do not have tostore any long-term credentials or access keys on the instance, which reduces the risk of compromise or misuse12.

The other options are not correct, because:

Security groups are virtual firewalls that control the inbound and outbound traffic for your EC2 instances. Security groups do not grant permissions to access other AWS services, but rather filter the network traffic based on rules that you define3.

AWS Firewall Manager is a service that helps you centrally configure and manage firewall rules across your accounts and resources. AWS Firewall Manager works with AWS WAF, AWS Shield Advanced, and Amazon VPC security groups. AWS Firewall Manager does not grant permissions to access other AWS services, but rather helps you enforce consistent security policies across your AWS infrastructure4.

IAM user SSH keys are credentials that allow you to connect to your EC2 instance using SSH. SSH keys do not grant permissions to access other AWS services, but rather authenticate your identity when you log in to your instance5.

Using an IAM role to grant permissions to applications running on Amazon EC2 instances - AWS Identity and Access Management

IAM roles for Amazon EC2 - Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud

Security groups for your VPC - Amazon Virtual Private Cloud

What is AWS Firewall Manager? - AWS Firewall Manager

Connecting to your Linux instance using SSH - Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud

AWS Software Development Kit (SDK) is a set of platform-specific tools for developers that let them integrate AWS service features directly into their applications. AWS SDKs provide libraries, code samples, documentation, and other resources to help developers write code that interacts with AWS APIs. AWS SDKs support various programming languages, such as Java, Python, Ruby, .NET, Node.js, Go, and more. AWS SDKs make it easier for developers to access AWS services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon EC2, Amazon DynamoDB, AWS Lambda, and more, from their applications. AWS SDKs also handle tasks such as authentication, error handling, retries, and data serialization, so developers can focus on their application logic.

Understanding Performance Efficiency: This pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework focuses on using computing resources efficiently to meet system requirements and maintain that efficiency as demand changes and technologies evolve.

Key Aspects of Performance Efficiency:

Selection: Choose the right resources for the job. This includes using the most appropriate instance types, storage options, and database services.

Review: Regularly review your architecture to take advantage of the latest AWS services and features, and to ensure you're using the best possible resource for your needs.

Monitoring: Continuously monitor your system performance, gather metrics, and use those metrics to make informed decisions about scaling and performance optimization.

Trade-offs: Understand the trade-offs between various performance-related aspects, such as cost, latency, and durability, and make decisions that align with your business goals.

How to Implement Performance Efficiency:

Use Auto Scaling: Implement Auto Scaling to automatically adjust the number of resources based on the demand.

Choose Appropriate Storage Options: Select the right storage solution (e.g., S3, EBS, or EFS) based on performance and access patterns.

Optimize Networking: Utilize Amazon CloudFront, AWS Global Accelerator, and VPC to optimize your network performance.

Regular Review and Testing: Regularly review your architecture, test performance under various loads, and adjust configurations as needed.

AWS Well-Architected Framework

Performance Efficiency Pillar

One of the primary advantages of the AWS Cloud is the ability to provision resources on demand. Users no longer need to over-provision or guess the capacity needed for infrastructure, which helps optimizecosts and improve agility. AWS handles infrastructure scaling dynamically based on the actual usage. Options B, C, and D are incorrect as users do not maintain sole ownership of IT hardware or control of underlying infrastructure, and while they do maintain some control over the operating system in some cases, it is not an advantage specific to the cloud.

AWS Secrets Manager is a service that helps you protect access to your applications, services, and IT resources. This service enables you to easily rotate, manage, and retrieve database credentials, API keys, and other secrets throughout their lifecycle. Users and applications retrieve secrets with a call to Secrets Manager APIs, eliminating the need to hardcode sensitive information in plain text. Secrets Manager offers secret rotation with built-in integration for Amazon RDS, Amazon Redshift, Amazon DocumentDB, and other AWS services1. You can also extend Secrets Manager to rotate other types of secrets, such as credentials for Oracle, SQL Server, or MongoDB databases, by using custom AWS Lambda functions2. Secrets Manager enables you to control access to secrets using fine-grained permissions and audit secret rotation centrally for resources in the AWS Cloud, third-party services, and on-premises3. Therefore, AWS Secrets Manager supports the requirement of rotating database user credentials with the least amount of operational overhead, compared to the other options. References:

What Is AWS Secrets Manager? - AWS Secrets Manager

Rotating Your AWS Secrets Manager Secrets - AWS Secrets Manager

AWS Secrets Manager Features - AWS Secrets Manager

AWS Organizations is the AWS service or feature that allows users to create new AWS accounts, group multiple accounts to organize workflows, and apply policies to groups of accounts. AWS Organizations enables users to centrally manage and govern their AWS environment across multiple accounts. Users can create organizational units (OUs) to group accounts based on their business needs, such as by function, project, or region. Users can also apply service control policies (SCPs) toOUs or individual accounts to define the permissions and restrictions for the AWS services and resources that they can access. AWS Organizations also offers features such as consolidated billing, account creation automation, and trusted access12. References:

AWS Organizations

What is AWS Organizations?

Amazon S3 (Simple Storage Service)is a scalable object storage service that allows users to store and retrieve any amount of data at any time from anywhere on the web. S3 provides the ability to make objects (files) publicly accessible via a public URL, which allows users to download files directly. S3 is highly durable, scalable, and secure, making it an ideal service for storing files that need to be accessed publicly.

Why other options are not suitable:

A. Amazon Redshift: A data warehouse service designed for complex queries and analytics, not for storing and publicly sharing files.

B. Amazon Elastic Block Store (Amazon EBS): Provides block storage for use with EC2 instances, but does not support public URLs or direct file access from the web.

C. Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS): A managed file storage service for use with EC2 instances, not designed for public access via URLs.

By implementingAWS CloudTrail, a company is adhering to the AWS Cloud design principle ofactivating traceability. AWS CloudTrail provides detailed logs of all API calls made in an AWS account, which helps monitor, troubleshoot, and detect unusual activity, thereby improving security and compliance. This supports the principle of "activating traceability" by enabling continuous monitoring and auditing of all actions and changes within the AWS environment.

B. Use serverless compute architectures: Incorrect, as this principle encourages the use of managed services that handle infrastructure, such as AWS Lambda, and is not directly related to CloudTrail.

C. Perform operations as code: Incorrect, as this principle emphasizes the use of code and automation for infrastructure management.

D. Go global in minutes: Incorrect, as this principle relates to the global deployment of applications and services.

AWS Cloud References:

AWS Well-Architected Framework

AWS CloudTrail

Customers share responsibility with AWS for security and compliance of AWS accounts and resources. This is part of the AWS shared responsibility model, which defines the division of responsibilities between AWS and the customer for security and compliance. AWS is responsible for the security of the cloud, which includes the physical and environmental controls of the AWS global infrastructure, such as power, cooling, fire suppression, and physical access. The customer is responsible for the security in the cloud, which includes the configuration and management of the AWS resources and applications, such as identity and access management, encryption, firewall, and backup. For more information, see AWS Shared Responsibility Model and AWS Cloud Security.

Amazon CloudFrontis a content delivery network (CDN) that helps deliver your website content globally with low latency by caching copies of your website content at edge locations around the world. This helps ensure that users receive content from the edge location closest to them, thereby reducing latency and improving user experience.

A. Amazon Route 53: Incorrect, as it is a DNS web service that routes users to the appropriate endpoint, but it does not cache content or reduce latency.

C. Elastic Load Balancing: Incorrect, as it distributes incoming application or network traffic across multiple targets, but does not cache content globally.

D. AWS Lambda: Incorrect, as it is a serverless compute service, not intended for content delivery.

AWS Cloud References:

Amazon CloudFront

According to theAWS Shared Responsibility Model, AWS is responsible for protecting the infrastructure that runs all of the services offered in the AWS Cloud, including Amazon S3. This infrastructure includes hardware, software, networking, and facilities that run AWS services.

A. Configure an S3 Lifecycle policy: Incorrect, as configuring S3 Lifecycle policies to manage object lifecycle (e.g., transitioning objects to different storage classes or deleting them after a certain period) is the customer's responsibility.

B. Activate S3 Versioning: Incorrect, as enabling S3 Versioning is a customer responsibility for managing data protection.

C. Configure S3 bucket policies: Incorrect, as setting and managing S3 bucket policies to control access is the customer's responsibility.

AWS Cloud References:

AWS Shared Responsibility Model

Amazon S3

AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) is a service that helps you securely control access to AWS resources for your users. You use IAM to control who can use your AWS resources (authentication) and what resources they can use and in what ways (authorization). IAM also enables you to follow the principle of least privilege, which means granting only the permissions that are necessary to perform a task1. References: AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) - AWS Documentation

AWS Cloud Development Kit (AWS CDK) is an open source software development framework that allows you to model and provision your cloud infrastructure using familiar programming languages such as TypeScript, Python, Java, and .NET. AWS CDK enables you to use the expressive power of your favorite language to define your cloud resources, such as compute, storage, network, and application services. AWS CDK also provides a library of high-level constructs that represent AWS services and best practices. AWS CDK uses AWS CloudFormation in the background to deploy your resources in a safe and repeatable manner12. References:

AWS Cloud Development Kit (CDK) – TypeScript and Python are Now Generally Available

AWS Cloud Development Kit (AWS CDK) - Introduction to DevOps on AWS

Amazon SageMakeris a fully managed service that provides every developer and data scientist with the ability to build, train, and deploy machine learning (ML) models quickly. It offers integrated Jupyter notebooks for data exploration, pre-built algorithms, and automatic model tuning to optimize hyperparameters.

Why other options are not suitable:

A. Amazon Personalize: A managed machine learning service that provides personalized recommendations, but does not offer the full suite of ML tools for building, training, and deploying models.

B. Amazon Comprehend: A natural language processing (NLP) service, not a general-purpose ML model building and deployment service.

C. Amazon Forecast: A managed service specifically for creating accurate forecasts using machine learning, not for general-purpose ML model development.

Amazon RDS is a fully managed relational database service that supports several database engines, including PostgreSQL. Amazon RDS can run a managed PostgreSQL database that provides online transaction processing (OLTP), which is a type of database workload that handles frequent read and write operations on small amounts of data. Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL offers high performance, availability, scalability, security, and compatibility with the PostgreSQL community edition. Amazon RDS also provides automated backups, point-in-time recovery, encryption, monitoring, and maintenance for PostgreSQL databases. References:

Hosted PostgreSQL - Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL

OLTP Database, MySQL And PostgreSQL ManagedDatabase - Amazon Aurora

PostgreSQL options on AWS: Self- managed, managed, and serverless

AWS CloudTrailis a service that enables governance, compliance, and operational and risk auditing of your AWS account. With CloudTrail, you can log, continuously monitor, and retain account activity related to actions across your AWS infrastructure. CloudTrail logs provide a history of AWS API calls for your account, including those made by the AWS Management Console, AWS SDKs, command-line tools, and other AWS services. In this case, AWS CloudTrail will help the administrator identify which user deleted the resources by reviewing the event history that records details such as which user performed the action, the time of the action, and which resources were affected.

B. Amazon Inspector: Incorrect, as it is a security assessment service that helps identify vulnerabilities and deviations from best practices, not for tracking user activity.

C. Amazon GuardDuty: Incorrect, as it is a threat detection service that monitors malicious activity and unauthorized behavior, not specifically for tracking changes made by users.

D. AWS Trusted Advisor: Incorrect, as it provides best practices and guidance for cost optimization, security, fault tolerance, and performance, not for logging user actions.

AWS Cloud References:

AWS CloudTrail

AWS IAM Identity Center (formerly AWS Single Sign-On or AWS SSO)provides a single sign-on experience for accessing AWS accounts and applications by integrating with third-party identity providers (IdPs) like Microsoft Active Directory, Okta, or any SAML 2.0-compliant IdP. This service allows employees to log in once using their existing corporate credentials managed by the third-party IdP and gain access to multiple AWS accounts and services without needing separate AWS credentials.

Why other options are not suitable:

A. AWS Directory Service: Provides a managed Microsoft Active Directory, but does not directly support single sign-on integration with third-party IdPs.

B. Amazon Cognito: Primarily used for managing authentication for web and mobile apps, not for integrating third-party IdPs for AWS management access.

D. AWS Resource Access Manager (AWS RAM): Used for sharing AWS resources across accounts, not for identity and access management.

Amazon RDS is a managed database service that handles most of the common database administration tasks, such as hardware provisioning, server maintenance, backup and recovery, patching, scaling, and replication. However, Amazon RDS does not optimize the application that interacts with the database. The company is stillresponsible for tuning the performance, security, and availability of the application according to its business requirements and best practices12.

AWS Database Migration Service (AWS DMS) is a cloud service that makes it possible to migrate relational databases, data warehouses, NoSQL databases, and other types of data stores. You can use AWS DMS to migrate your data into the AWS Cloud or between combinations of cloud and on-premises setups. With AWS DMS, you can discover your source data stores, convert your source schemas, and migrate your data. AWS DMS supports migration between 20-plus database and analytics engines, such as Oracle to Amazon Aurora MySQL-Compatible Edition, MySQL to Amazon Relational Database (RDS) for MySQL, Microsoft SQL Server to Amazon Aurora PostgreSQL-Compatible Edition, MongoDB to Amazon DocumentDB (with MongoDB compatibility), Oracle to Amazon Redshift, and Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3). You can perform one-time migrations or replicate ongoing changes to keep sources and targets in sync. AWS DMS automatically manages the deployment, management, and monitoring of all hardware and software needed for your migration. AWS DMS is a highly resilient, secure cloud service that provides database discovery, schema conversion, data migration, and ongoing replication to and from a wide range of databases and analytics systems12. References:

Database Migration - AWS Database Migration Service - AWS

What is AWS Database Migration Service? - AWS Database Migration Service

TheReliabilitypillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework focuses on the ability of a system to recover from failures and disruptions, dynamically acquire computing resources to meet demand, and mitigate disruptions such as misconfigurations or network issues. This includes the ability to automatically recover from service interruptions and implement mechanisms that anticipate, respond to, and prevent failures.

A. Security: Incorrect, as it focuses on protecting information, systems, and assets while delivering business value.

B. Performance efficiency: Incorrect, as it focuses on using IT and computing resources efficiently.

C. Operational excellence: Incorrect, as it focuses on operations in the cloud, including monitoring and managing systems.

AWS Cloud References:

AWS Well-Architected Framework - Reliability Pillar

AWS Database Migration Service (DMS) and AWS Schema Conversion Tool are the primary services for migrating a commercial relational database to an Amazon-managed open-source database. AWS DMS helps migrate the data, while the AWS Schema Conversion Tool converts the database schema from the source database format to the target format, including SQL code. AWS SDKs are for software development, AWS Systems Manager is for operational management, and Amazon EMR is for big data processing, which are not relevant to this use case.

Understanding High Availability: High availability (HA) refers to systems that are durable and likely to operate continuously without failure for a long time. HA ensures that an architecture can withstand failures with minimal downtime.

Importance of High Availability:

Redundancy: Systems are designed with redundancy to prevent single points of failure.

Fault Tolerance: Ensures that failures do not result in significant downtime, maintaining service continuity.

Automated Recovery: Utilizes automated recovery mechanisms to quickly restore services in the event of a failure.

AWS Services for High Availability:

Multi-AZ Deployments: Services like RDS, DynamoDB, and others support Multi-AZ deployments for fault tolerance.

Elastic Load Balancing: Distributes traffic across multiple instances or availability zones to ensure no single point of failure.

Auto Scaling: Automatically adjusts the number of instances based on demand, ensuring availability even during traffic spikes.

AWS Well-Architected Framework: Reliability

AWS Direct Connect is an AWS service that allows users to establish a dedicated network connection between their on-premises data center and the AWS Cloud. This connection bypasses the public internet and provides more predictable network performance, reduced bandwidth costs, and increased security. Users can choose from different port speeds and connection types, and use AWS Direct Connect to access AWS services in any AWS Region globally. Users can also use AWS Direct Connect in conjunction with AWS VPN to create a hybrid network architecture that combines the benefits of both private and public connectivity. References: AWS Direct Connect, [AWS Cloud Practitioner Essentials: Module 3 - Compute in the Cloud]

The creation of an organization in AWS Organizations requires the use of AWS account root user credentials. The AWS account root user is the email address that was used to create the AWS account. The root user has complete access to all AWS services and resources in the account, and can perform sensitive tasks such as changing the account settings, closing the account, or creating an organization. The root user credentials should be used sparingly and securely, and only for tasks that cannot be performed by IAM users or roles4

Agility is the AWS Cloud benefit that gives a company the ability to quickly deploy cloud resources to access compute, storage, and database infrastructures in a matter of minutes. Agility means that you can reduce the time to make IT resources available to your developers from weeks to just minutes, resulting in a dramatic increase in innovation and responsiveness1. AWS provides a range of services and tools that enable you to launch, scale, and manage your cloud applications with ease and speed, such as AWS CloudFormation, AWS Elastic Beanstalk, AWS CodeDeploy, and AWS Quick Starts2345. References:

Six advantages of cloud computing - Overview of Amazon Web Services

[AWS CloudFormation]

[AWS Elastic Beanstalk]

[AWS CodeDeploy]

AWS Quick Starts

According to theAWS Shared Responsibility Model, the customer is responsible for managing the guest operating system (including patches and updates) and any applications that they run on their Amazon EC2 instances.

Why other options are not suitable:

B. Control physical access to an AWS data center: AWS is responsible for the physical security of its data centers.

C. Control access to AWS underlying hardware: AWS manages the hardware infrastructure.

D. Patch a host operating system that is deployed on Amazon S3: Amazon S3 is a managed storage service, and AWS manages the underlying infrastructure, including the operating system.

For workloads running 24/7 for a year, Standard Reserved Instances provide a significant discount compared to On-Demand pricing. Choosing the "All Upfront" payment option maximizes the cost savings as AWS offers the highest discount for upfront payments. Convertible Reserved Instances provide flexibility to change the instance type but usually at a slightly higher cost than Standard Reserved Instances. Compute Savings Plans offer cost savings, but in this scenario, the best optimization would be a combination of Standard Reserved Instances with All Upfront payment. Spot Instances are not suitable due to their interruptible nature.

AWS Software Development Kit (SDK) is a set of platform-specific building tools for developers. It allows developers to access AWS services from application code using familiar programming languages. It provides pre-built components and libraries that can be incorporated into applications, as well as tools to debug, monitor, and optimize performance2. References: What is SDK? - SDK Explained - AWS

AWS Trusted Advisoris a service that provides real-time guidance to help you provision your resources following AWS best practices. It offers checks in five categories: cost optimization, performance, security, fault tolerance, and service limits. By continuously monitoring the AWS environment, AWS Trusted Advisor helps ensure that additional developments, integrations, changes, and growth do not jeopardize the optimized infrastructure by providing ongoing optimization and security recommendations.

B. AWS Health Dashboard: Incorrect, as it provides personalized view of service health and status updates but does not offer continuous optimization and security advice.

C. Amazon Connect: Incorrect, as it is a contact center service, not related to infrastructure optimization or security.

D. AWS Systems Manager: Incorrect, as it provides operational insights and management for AWS resources but is not specifically focused on ongoing optimization and security checks.

AWS Cloud References:

AWS Trusted Advisor

AWS Marketplace is an online store that helps customers find, buy, and immediately start using the software and services that run on AWS. Customers can choose from a wide range of software products in popular categories such as security, networking, storage, machine learning, business intelligence, database, and DevOps. Customers can also use AWS Marketplace to purchase software as a service (SaaS) solutions that are integrated with AWS. Customers can benefit from simplified procurement, billing, and deployment processes, as well as flexible pricing options and free trials. Customers can also leverage AWS Marketplace to discover and subscribe to solutions offered by AWS Partners, such as the security software vendor mentioned in the question. References: AWS Marketplace, [AWS Marketplace: Software as a Service (SaaS)], [AWS Cloud Practitioner Essentials: Module 6 - AWS Pricing, Billing, and Support]

The AWS Well-Architected Framework is a set of six pillars and lenses that help cloud architects design and run workloads in the cloud. The six pillars are: operational excellence, security, reliability, performance efficiency, cost optimization, and sustainability. Each pillar has a set of design principles and best practices that guide the architectural decisions. High availability is not a separate pillar, but a quality that can be achieved by applying the principles of the reliability pillar. Going global in minutes and continuous development are not pillars of the framework, but possible benefits of using AWS services and following the framework’s recommendations. References: AWS Well-Architected - Build secure, efficient cloud applications, AWS Well-Architected Framework, The 6 Pillars of the AWS Well-Architected Framework

AWS Direct Connect is a service that establishes a dedicated network connection between your on-premises network and one or more AWS Regions. AWS Direct Connect can be used to create a private connection between an on-premises workload and an AWS Cloud workload, bypassing the public internet and reducing network costs, latency, and bandwidth issues. AWS Direct Connect can also provide increased security and reliability for your hybrid cloud applications and data transfers. References:

AWS Direct Connect

What is AWS Direct Connect?

AWS Direct Connect User Guide

Amazon CloudFront is a fast content delivery network (CDN) service that securely delivers data, videos, applications, and APIs to customers globally with low latency, high transfer speeds, all within a developer-friendly environment. CloudFront enables companies to deploy an application close to end users by caching the application’s content at edge locations that are geographically closer to the users. This reduces the network latency and improves the user experience. CloudFront also integrates with other AWS services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon EC2, AWS Lambda, AWS Shield, and AWS WAF, to provide a secure and scalable solution for delivering applications12. References:

What Is Amazon CloudFront? - Amazon CloudFront

Amazon CloudFront Features - Amazon CloudFront

According to the AWS shared responsibility model, the customer is responsible for the security in the cloud, which includes configuring firewalls and networks. AWS provides security groups and network access control lists (NACLs) as firewall features that customers can use to control the traffic to andfrom their AWS resources. Customers are also responsible for managing their own virtual private clouds (VPCs), subnets, route tables, internet gateways, and other network components. AWS is responsible for the security of the cloud, which includes the physical security of the facilities, thehost operating system and virtualization layer, and the AWS global network infrastructure12. References:

Shared Responsibility Model - Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Shared responsibility model - Amazon Web Services: Risk and Compliance

AWS Service Catalog enables companies to create, manage, and distribute catalogs of approved infrastructure as code (IaC) templates and software configurations. This service supports infrastructure automation by allowing users to deploy resources using predefined templates, which align with the company's policies and best practices. It helps in managing cloud resources at scale by utilizing IaC principles, enabling consistent deployments, and enforcing governance across AWS resources. AWS Service Catalog is an excellent choice for organizations implementing IaC.

AWS Organizationsis a service that helps users centrally manage and govern multiple AWS accounts. With AWS Organizations, a company can consolidate billing and receive a single bill for all AWS accounts under an organization, making it easier for the finance team to track costs.

Why other options are not suitable:

B. AWS Trusted Advisor: Provides real-time guidance to help optimize AWS resources, not for consolidated billing.

C. Cost Explorer: A tool for visualizing and managing AWS costs and usage, but it does not consolidate billing.

D. AWS Budgets: Allows setting custom budgets and alerts but does not consolidate billing across accounts.

VPC Flow Logs is a feature that enables you to capture information about the IP traffic going to and from network interfaces in your VPC. Flow log data can be published to the following locations: Amazon CloudWatch Logs, Amazon S3, or Amazon Kinesis Data Firehose. You can use VPC Flow Logs to monitor network traffic, diagnose security issues, troubleshoot connectivity problems, and perform network forensics1. References:

Logging IP traffic using VPC Flow Logs - Amazon Virtual Private Cloud

Amazon S3 is a service that provides highly durable and cost-effective object storage for a variety of use cases, including backup and archive, big data analytics, disaster recovery, and cloud applications. Amazon S3 offers 99.999999999% (11 9’s) of durability, meaning that data is designed to withstand the loss of two facilities concurrently. Amazon S3 also offers several storage classes with different price and performance characteristics, such as S3 Glacier and S3 Glacier Deep Archive, which are ideal for long-term archival of data that is rarely accessed. AWS Snowball, AWS Storage Gateway, and Amazon Kinesis are not designed to provide the same level of durability and cost-effectiveness as Amazon S3 for storing call recordings for 6 years. Source: Amazon S3

According to the AWS shared responsibility model, AWS is responsible for the security of the cloud, while the customer is responsible for the security in the cloud. This means that AWS provides the physical and environmental controls, the service and communications protection, and the awareness and training for its employees, while the customer provides the patch and configuration management, the identity and access management, the data encryption, and the firewall configuration for its resources3.

The AWS Cloud benefit that describes the ability to acquire resources as they are needed and release resources when they are no longer needed is elasticity. Elasticity means that users can quickly add and remove resources to match the demand of their applications, and only pay for what they use. Elasticity enables users to handle unpredictable workloads, reduce costs, and improve performance1. Economies of scale, agility, and security are other benefits of the AWS Cloud, but they do not describe the specific ability of acquiring and releasing resources on demand.

AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS) is a managed service that enables you to easily encrypt your data. AWS KMS provides you with centralized control of the encryption keys used to protect your data. You can use AWS KMS to encrypt data in Amazon RDS and Amazon EBS volumes12

AWS CodePipeline is a continuous delivery and deployment service that automates the release process of software applications across different stages, such as source code, build, test, and deploy2. AWSAppSync, AWS Cloud9, and AWS CodeCommit are other AWS services related to application development, but they do not provide continuous delivery and deployment solutions34 .

 Deploying the application in multiple Availability Zones is the best way to ensure high availability for the application. Availability Zones are isolated locations within an AWS Region that are engineered to be fault-tolerant from failures in other Availability Zones. By deploying the application in multiple Availability Zones, the company can reduce the impact of outages and increase the resilience of the application. Deploying the application in a single Availability Zone, on AWS Direct Connect, or on Reserved Instances does not provide the same level of high availability as deploying the application in multiple Availability Zones. Source: Availability Zones

The architecture deployment model that the company should use to meet this requirement is A. Multi-Region.

A multi-region deployment model is a cloud computing architecture that distributes an application and its data across multiple geographic regions. A multi-region deployment model enables a company to achieve global reach, high availability, disaster recovery, and performance optimization.By deploying an application inmultiple regions, a company can serve customers from the nearest region, reduce latency, increase redundancy, and comply with data sovereignty regulations12.

A single-region deployment model is a cloud computing architecture that runs an application and its data within a single geographic region. A single-region deployment model is simpler and cheaper than a multi-region deployment model, but it has limited scalability, availability, and performance.A single-region deployment model may notbe suitable for a company that wants to deploy an application globally, as it may face challenges such as network latency, regional outages, or regulatory compliance12.

A multi-AZ (Availability Zone) deployment model is a cloud computing architecture that distributes an application and its data across multiple isolated locations within a single region. An Availability Zone is a physically separate location within an AWS Region that has independent power, cooling, and networking.A multi-AZ deployment model enhances the availability and durability of an application by providing redundancy and fault tolerance within a region34.

A single-AZ deployment model is a cloud computing architecture that runs an application and its data within a single Availability Zone. A single-AZ deployment model is the simplest and most cost-effective option, but it has no redundancy or fault tolerance.A single-AZ deployment model may not be suitable for a company that wants to deploy an application globally, as it may face challenges such as network latency, regional outages, or regulatory compliance34.

AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS) is designed to integrate with various AWS services to encrypt data at rest. It provides a secure and highly available service to create, control, and manage encryption keys used to encrypt your data. AWS Certificate Manager (ACM) is for managing SSL/TLS certificates, AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) is for managing user access and permissions, and AWS Security Hub is for security monitoring and compliance, but none of these services provide data encryption at rest like AWS KMS.QUESTION NO: 298

A company has an AWS Business Support plan. The company needs to gain access to the AWS DDoS Response Team (DRT) to help mitigate DDoS events.

Which AWS service or resource must the company use to meet these requirements?

A. AWS Shield Standard

B. AWS Enterprise Support

C. AWS WAF

D. AWS Shield Advanced

Answer: D

AWS Shield Advanced provides enhanced protection against DDoS attacks and includes access to the AWS DDoS Response Team (DRT) to help mitigate complex DDoS events. AWS Shield Standard offers basic DDoS protection, which is included with AWS services, but does not provide access to the DRT. AWS WAF is a web application firewall, and AWS Enterprise Support is a premium support plan but does not specifically provide DDoS mitigation services or access to the DRT.

Amazon QuickSightis a scalable, serverless, machine learning-powered business intelligence (BI) service built for the cloud. It allows users to create and publish interactive dashboards with insights powered by machine learning, such as anomaly detection and forecasting. This makes it the best option for creating interactive BI dashboards that require machine learning insights.

A. AWS Glue Studio: Incorrect, as it is an ETL (extract, transform, load) tool for preparing and transforming data, not for creating BI dashboards.

C. Amazon Redshift: Incorrect, as it is a data warehousing service that can be used with BI tools but is not specifically designed for creating and publishing dashboards.

D. Amazon Athena: Incorrect, as it is an interactive query service for analyzing data in Amazon S3 using standard SQL, not for creating BI dashboards.

AWS Cloud References:

Amazon QuickSight

AWS Direct Connect is a cloud service solution that makes it easy to establish a dedicated network connection from your premises to AWS. Using AWS Direct Connect, you can establish private connectivity between AWS and your datacenter, office, or colocation environment, which in many cases can reduce your network costs, increase bandwidth throughput, and provide a more consistent network experience than internet-based connections12. References: 1: Dedicated Network Connection - AWS Direct Connect - AWS, 2: What is AWS Direct Connect? - AWS Direct Connect

The ability to scale resources up and down based on application load is tied to the advantage of "Stop guessing capacity." This feature allows users to scale resources automatically to match the demand, thereby avoiding over-provisioning or under-provisioning of resources. "Go global in minutes," "Benefit from massive economies of scale," and "Trade fixed expense for variable expense" are other advantages of cloud computing, but they do not specifically address scaling resources up and down based on load.

AWS Elastic Beanstalkis a fully managed service designed for developers who want to deploy and manage their applications without having to provision and manage the underlying infrastructure themselves. Developers can simply upload their code, and Elastic Beanstalk automatically handles the deployment, including provisioning the necessary resources (such as EC2 instances, load balancers, and auto-scaling).

A. AWS CloudFormation: Incorrect, as it is an infrastructure-as-code service for defining and provisioning AWS resources but does not directly deploy applications.

B. AWS CodeBuild: Incorrect, as it is a service for building and testing code, not for deploying applications.

D. AWS CodeDeploy: Incorrect, as it is specifically designed for automating software deployments to a variety of compute services, including EC2, but it does not manage the underlying infrastructure.

AWS Cloud References:

AWS Elastic Beanstalk

AWS WAF is a web application firewall that helps protect web applications from common web exploits, such as SQL injection attacks. It allows customers to create custom rules that block malicious requests. AWS Shield is a managed service that protects against distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, not SQL injection attacks. Network ACLs and security groups are network-level security features that filter traffic based on IP addresses and ports, not web requests or SQL queries. References: [AWS WAF], [AWS Shield], [Network ACLs], [Security groups]

AWS serverless computing is a way of building and running applications without thinking about servers. AWS manages the infrastructure for you, so you don’t have to provision, scale, patch, or monitor servers. You only pay for the compute time you consume, and you can focus on your application logic instead of managing servers12. References: Serverless Computing – Amazon Web Services, AWS Serverless Computing, Benefits, Architecture and Use-cases - XenonStack

Amazon EC2 is a service that provides resizable compute capacity in the cloud. Users can launch and manage virtual servers, known as instances, that run on the AWS infrastructure. Users are responsible for maintaining the underlying operating system of the instances, as well as any applications or software that run on them. Amazon DynamoDB is a service that provides a fully managed NoSQL database that delivers fast and consistent performance at any scale. Users do not need to manage the underlying operating system or the database software. Amazon S3 is a service that provides scalable and durable object storage in the cloud. Users do not need to manage the underlying operating system or the storage infrastructure. AWS Lambda is a service that allows users to run code without provisioning or managing servers. Users only need to upload their code and configure the triggers and parameters. AWS Lambda takes care of the underlying operating system and the execution environment.

Scaling horizontally across multiple Availability Zones is a way to adopt a highly available architecture, as it increases the fault tolerance and resilience of the application. Scaling vertically to a larger EC2 instance size is a way to improve the performance of the application, but it does not improve the availability. Purchasing an EC2 Dedicated Instance is a way to isolate the instance from other AWS customers, but it does not improve the availability. Changing the EC2 instance family to a compute optimized instance is a way to optimize the instance type for the workload, but it does not improve the availability. These concepts are explained in the AWS Well-Architected Framework2.

VPC Flow Logs is a feature that enables you to capture information about the IP traffic going to and from network interfaces in your VPC. Flow log data can be published to Amazon CloudWatch Logs, Amazon S3, or Amazon Kinesis Data Firehose. You can use VPC Flow Logs to diagnose network issues, monitor traffic patterns, detect security anomalies, and comply with auditing requirements34. References: Logging IP traffic using VPC Flow Logs - Amazon Virtual Private Cloud, New – VPC Traffic Mirroring – Capture & Inspect Network Traffic | AWS News Blog

AWS Shield is a managed DDoS protection service that safeguards applications running on AWS from distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. DDoS attacks are malicious attempts to disrupt the normal functioning of a website or application by overwhelming it with a large volume of traffic from multiple sources. AWS Shield provides two tiers of protection: Standard and Advanced. AWS Shield Standard is automatically enabled for all AWS customers at no additional cost. It protects your AWS resources, such as Amazon CloudFront, AWS Global Accelerator, and Amazon Route 53, from the most common and frequently occurring network and transport layer DDoS attacks. AWS Shield Advanced is an optional paid service that provides additional protection for your AWS resources and applications, such as Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2), Elastic Load Balancing (ELB), Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3), Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS), and AWS Elastic Beanstalk. AWSShield Advanced offers enhanced detection and mitigation capabilities, 24/7 access to the AWS DDoS Response Team (DRT), real-time visibility and reporting, and cost protection against DDoS-related spikes in your AWS bill12

 AWS Shield, What is a DDOS Attack & How to Protect Your Site Against One

AWS Marketplace is a digital catalog that offers thousands of software products and solutions from independent software vendors (ISVs) and AWS partners. Customers can use AWS Marketplace to find, buy, and deploy software on AWS. Some of the benefits of using AWS Marketplace are:

Speed of business: You can quickly and easily discover and deploy software that meets your business needs, without having to go through lengthy procurement processes. You can also use AWS Marketplace to test and compare different solutions before making a purchase decision.

Fewer legal objections: You can benefit from standardized contract terms and conditions that are pre-negotiated between AWS and the ISVs. This reduces the time and effort required to review and approve legal agreements.

Pay-as-you-go pricing is one of the main benefits of AWS. With pay-as-you-go pricing, you pay only for what you use, when you use it. There are no long-term contracts, termination fees, or complex licensing. You replace upfront expenses with lower variable costs and pay only for the resources you consume.

AWS Cloud Adoption Framework (AWS CAF) is a tool that helps organizations understand how cloud adoption transforms the way they work, and it provides structure to identify and address gaps in skills and processes. Applying the AWS CAF in your organization results in an actionable plan that helps you prepare the cloud environment, enable your staff with new skills, and migrate your applications. AWS Pricing Calculator is a tool that helps you estimate the cost of AWS services for your use cases and compare the cost of different AWS service configurations. AWS Well-Architected Framework is a tool that helps you review and improve your cloud-based architectures and better understand the business impact of your design decisions. AWS Budgets is a tool that helps you plan your service usage, service costs, and instance reservations, and track how close your plan is to your budgeted amount.

S3 Versioning is a feature that allows you to keep multiple versions of an object in the same bucket. You can use S3 Versioning to protect your data from accidental deletion or overwriting by enabling it on a bucket or a specific object. S3 Versioning also allows you to restore previous versions of an object if needed. S3 Lifecycle rules are used to automate the transition of objects between storage classes or to expire objects after a certain period of time. S3 bucket policies are used to control access to the objects in a bucket. S3 server-side encryption is used toencrypt the data at rest in S3. References: S3 Versioning, S3 Lifecycle rules, S3 bucket policies, S3 server-side encryption

 Establishing an AWS Direct Connect connection between the VPC and the company’s on-premises network is the action that the company should take to meet the requirement of having a dedicated connection between the VPC and the company’s on-premises network. AWS Direct Connect is a service that lets you establish a dedicated network connection between your network and one of the AWS Direct Connect locations. Using AWS Direct Connect, you can create a private connection between AWS and your datacenter, office, or colocation environment, which can reduce your network costs, increase bandwidth throughput, and provide a more consistent network experience than internet-based connections. Establishing a VPN connection between the VPC and the company’s on-premises network is an action that the company can take to create a secure and encrypted connection between the VPC and the company’s on-premises network, but it is not a dedicated connection, as it uses the public internet as the transport mechanism. Attaching an internet gateway to the VPC and using the AWS public endpoints for connectivity is an action that the company can take to enable communication between the VPC and the internet, but it is not a dedicated connection, as it also uses the public internet as the transport mechanism. Configuring Amazon Connect to provide connectivity between the VPC and the company’s on-premises network is not an action that the company can take, because Amazon Connect is a service that lets you set up and manage a contact center in the cloud, but it does not provide network connectivity between the VPC and the company’s on-premises network.

 The AWS service or feature that the company should use to categorize and track AWS usage cost based on business categories is cost allocation tags. Cost allocation tags are key-value pairs that users can attach to AWS resources to organize and track their AWS costs. Users can use cost allocation tags to filter and group their AWS costs by categories such as project, department, environment, or application. Users can also use cost allocation tags to generate detailed billing reports that show the costs associated with each tag3. AWS Organizations, AWS Security Hub, and AWS Cost and Usage Report are other AWS services or features that can help users with different aspects of their AWS usage, such as managing multiple accounts, monitoring security issues, or analyzing billing data, but they do not enable users to categorize and track AWS costs based on business categories.

Amazon Personalize is an AWS service that helps developers quickly build and deploy a custom recommendation engine with real-time personalization and user segmentation1. It uses machine learning (ML) to analyze customer data and provide relevant recommendations based on their preferences, behavior, and context.Amazon Personalize can be used for various use cases such as optimizing recommendations, targeting customers more accurately, maximizing the value of unstructured text, and promoting items using business rules1.

The other options are not suitable for providing product recommendations based on customer data. Amazon Polly is a service that converts text into lifelike speech. Amazon Comprehend is a service that uses natural language processing (NLP) toextract insights from text and documents. Amazon Rekognition is a service that uses computer vision (CV) to analyze images and videos for faces, objects, scenes, and activities.

1: Cloud Products - Amazon Web Services (AWS)

2: Recommender System – Amazon Personalize – Amazon Web Services

3: Top 25 AWS Services List 2023 - GeeksforGeeks

4: AWS to Azure services comparison - Azure Architecture Center

5: The 25+ Best AWS Cost Optimization Tools (Updated 2023) - CloudZero

6: Amazon Polly – Text-to-Speech Service - AWS

7: Natural Language Processing - Amazon Comprehend - AWS

8: Image and Video Analysis - Amazon Rekognition - AWS

 The trade of infrastructure expenses for operating expenses is one of the benefits of the AWS Cloud. By moving to the AWS Cloud, the company can avoid the upfront costs of purchasing and maintaining on-premises infrastructure, such as servers, storage, network, and software. Instead, the company can pay only for the AWS resources and services that they use, as they use them. This reduces the risk and complexity of planning and managing IT infrastructure, and allows the company to focus on innovation and growth. Increased speed to market, massive economies of scale, and the ability to go global in minutes are also benefits of the AWS Cloud, but they are not the best ones to describe this scenario. Increased speed to market means that the company can launch new products and services faster by using AWS services and tools. Massive economies of scale means that the company can benefit from the lower costs and higher performance that AWS achieves by operating at a large scale. The ability to go global in minutes means that the company can deploy their applications and data in multiple regions and availability zones around the world to reach their customers faster and improve performance and reliability5

AWS CloudFormation and AWS Cloud Development Kit (AWS CDK) are AWS services that can limit manual errors by consistently provisioning AWS resources in multiple environments. AWS CloudFormation is a service that enables you to model and provision AWS resources using templates. You can use AWS CloudFormation to define the AWS resources and their dependencies that you need for your applications, and to automate the creation and update of those resources across multiple environments, such as development, testing, and production. AWS CloudFormation helps you ensure that your AWS resources are configured consistently and correctly, and that you can easily replicate or modify them as needed. AWS Cloud Development Kit (AWS CDK) is a service that enables you to use familiar programming languages, such as Python, TypeScript, Java, and C#, to define and provision AWS resources. You can use AWS CDK to write code that synthesizes into AWS CloudFormation templates, and to leverage the existing libraries and tools of your preferred language. AWS CDK helps you reduce the complexity and errors of writing and maintaining AWS CloudFormation templates, and to apply the best practices and standards of software development to your AWS infrastructure.

 AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) is a service that enables you to manage access to AWS services and resources securely. You can use IAM to perform the following actions:

Control access to AWS service APIs and to other specific resources: You can create users, groups, roles, and policies that define who can access which AWS resources and how. You can also use IAM to grant temporary access to users or applications that need to perform certain tasks on your behalf3

Protect the AWS environment using multi-factor authentication (MFA): You can enable MFA for your IAM users and root user to add an extra layer of security to your AWS account. MFA requires users to provide a unique authentication code from an approved device or SMS text message, in addition to their user name and password, when they sign in to AWS4

 AWS Secrets Manager is a service that helps you protect secrets needed to access your applications, services, and IT resources. You can use AWS Secrets Manager to store, rotate, and retrieve database credentials, API keys, and other secrets throughout their lifecycle. AWS Secrets Manager eliminates the need to hardcode sensitive information in plain text, and reduces the risk of unauthorized access or leakage. AWS Secrets Manager also integrates with other AWS services, such as AWS Lambda, Amazon RDS, and AWS CloudFormation, to simplify the management of secrets across your environment5

 The AWS Well-Architected Framework is a set of best practices and guidelines for designing and operating reliable, secure, efficient, and cost-effective systems in the cloud. The framework consists of five pillars: operational excellence, performance efficiency, reliability, security, and cost optimization. The security pillar covers the AWS shared responsibility model, which defines the security and compliance responsibilities of AWS and the customers. You can learn more about the AWS Well-Architected Framework from [this whitepaper] or [this digital course].

AWS Artifact is a service that provides on-demand access to AWS security and compliance documents, such as AWS ISO certifications, Payment Card Industry (PCI) reports, and Service Organization Control (SOC) reports. You can download these documents and submit them as evidence to your auditors or regulators to demonstrate the security and compliance of the AWS infrastructure and services that you use. AWS Artifact also allows you to review, accept, and manage AWS agreements, such as the Business Associate Addendum (BAA) for customers who are subject to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). References: AWS Artifact, What is AWS Artifact?

AWS IAM Access Analyzer is an AWS service that helps customers identify and review the resources in their AWS account that are shared with an external entity, such as another AWS account, a root user, an organization, or a public entity. AWS IAM Access Analyzer uses automated reasoning, a form of mathematical logic and inference, to analyze the resource-based policies in the account and generate comprehensive findings that show the access level, the source of the access, the affected resource, and the condition under which the access applies. Customers can use AWS IAM Access Analyzer to audit their shared resources, validate their access policies, and monitor any changes to the resource sharing status. References: AWSIAM Access Analyzer, Identify and review resources shared with external entities, How AWS IAM Access Analyzer works

IAM credential report is a feature that allows you to generate and download a report that lists all IAM users in your AWS account and the status of their various credentials, including access keys and MFA devices. You can use this report to audit the security status of your IAM users and ensure that they follow the best practices for using AWS1.

AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS) is a service that allows you to create and manage encryption keys to protect your data. It does not provide information about IAM users or their credentials2.

IAM Access Analyzer is a feature that helps you identify the resources in your AWS account, such as S3 buckets or IAM roles, that are shared with an external entity. It does not provide information about IAM users or their credentials3.

Amazon CloudWatch is a service that monitors and collects metrics, logs, and events from your AWS resources and applications. It does not provide information about IAM users or their credentials4.

 The AWS shared responsibility model describes the division of responsibilities between AWS and the customer for security and compliance. AWS is responsible for the security of the cloud, which includes the hardware, software, networking, and facilities that run AWS services. The customer is responsible for security in the cloud, which includes the customer data, applications, operating systems, and network and firewall configurations. Therefore, updating the guest operating system on Amazon EC2 instances is the customer’s responsibility2

Network ACLs are a feature that provide a layer of security at the subnet level by acting as a firewall to control traffic in and out of one or more subnets. Network ACLs can be configured with rules that allow or deny traffic based on the source and destination IP addresses, ports, and protocols5. Security groups are a feature that provide a layer of security at the instance level by acting as a firewall to control traffic to and from one or more instances. Security groups can be configured with rules that allow or deny traffic based on the source and destination IP addresses, ports, protocols, and security groups. NAT gateways are a feature that enable instances in a private subnet to connect to the internet or other AWS services, but prevent the internet from initiating a connection with those instances. Route tables are a feature that determine where network traffic from a subnet or gateway is directed.

The correct answer is A because Amazon AppStream 2.0 is a service that will help the company deploy the application without investing in backend infrastructure or high end client hardware. Amazon AppStream 2.0 is a fully managed, secure application streaming service that allows customers to stream desktop applications from AWS to any device running a web browser. Amazon AppStream 2.0 handles the provisioning, scaling, patching, and maintenance of the backend infrastructure, and delivers high performance and responsive user experience. The other options are incorrect because they are not services that will help the company deploy the application without investing in backend infrastructure or high end client hardware. AWS AppSync is a service that enables customers to create flexible APIs for synchronizing data across multiple data sources. Amazon WorkLink is a service that enables customers to provide secure, one-click access to internalwebsites and web apps from mobile devices. AWS Elastic Beanstalk is a service that enables customers to deploy and manage web applications using popular platforms such as Java, .NET, PHP, and Node.js. Reference: [Amazon AppStream 2.0 FAQs]

 Pay-as-you-go pricing is an AWS benefit that demonstrates the ability of users to replace upfront fixed expenses with variable expenses. With pay-as-you-go pricing, users only pay for the resources they consume, without any long-term contracts or commitments. This can lower the total cost of ownership and increase the return on investment. Pay-as-you-go pricing also provides flexibility and scalability, as users can adjust their resource usage according to their changing needs and demands. AWS Cloud Value FrameworkAWS Certified Cloud Practitioner - aws.amazon.com

 B is correct because Reserved Instances are the instance purchasing option that offers the most cost-effective way to use Amazon EC2 instances for a stable production workload that will run for 1 year, as they provide significant discounts compared to On-Demand Instances in exchange for a commitment to use a specific amount of computing power for a period of time. A is incorrect because Dedicated Hosts are the instance purchasing option that allows customers to use physical servers that are fully dedicated to their use, which is more expensive and less flexible than Reserved Instances. C is incorrect because On-Demand Instances are the instance purchasing option that allows customers to pay for compute capacity by the hour or second with no long-term commitments, which is more suitable for short-term, variable, and unpredictable workloads. D is incorrect because Spot Instances are the instance purchasing option that allows customers to bid on spare Amazon EC2 computing capacity, which is more suitable for flexible, scalable, and fault-tolerant workloads that can tolerate interruptions.

 Amazon CloudWatch is a service that provides monitoring and observability for AWS resources and applications. Users can create custom dashboards to collect and visualize metrics, logs, alarms, and events from different sources5. AWS X-Ray is a service that provides distributed tracing and analysis for applications. AWS Systems Manager is a service that provides operational management for AWS resources and applications. AWS CloudTrail is a service that provides governance, compliance, and auditing for AWS account activity.

Edge locations are sites that Amazon CloudFront uses to cache copies of your content for faster delivery to users at any location. You can use Amazon CloudFront to deliver your entire website, including dynamic, static, streaming, and interactive content using a global network of edge locations. Requests for your content are automatically routed to the nearest edge location, so content is delivered with the best possible performance3. Edge locations can also host AWS Lambda functions to perform compute operations for your web application as close to end users as possible4.

AWS Enterprise Support provides customers with a designated technical account manager (TAM) who is a single point of contact for all technical and operational issues. The TAM provides consultative architectural and operational guidance delivered in thecontext of the customer’s applications and use-cases to help them achieve the greatest value from AWS. The TAM also helps customers with proactive services, such as strategic business reviews, security improvement programs, guided Well-Architected reviews, cost optimization workshops, and more1.

A full set of AWS Trusted Advisor checks is not an additional benefit of AWS Enterprise Support, as it is also included in the AWS Business Support plan2. AWS Trusted Advisor is a tool that provides best practice recommendations for cost optimization, performance, security, fault tolerance, and service limits.

Phone, email, and chat access to cloud support engineers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week is not an additional benefit of AWS Enterprise Support, as it is also included in the AWS Business Support plan2. Cloud support engineers can help customers with technical issues, such as troubleshooting, configuration, usage, and service features.

A consultative review and architecture guidance for the company’s applications is not an additional benefit of AWS Enterprise Support, as it is also included in the AWS Business Support plan2. Customers can request a consultative review from a solutions architect who will provide best practices and recommendations based on the customer’s use-cases and goals.

The AWS service or resource that will meet these requirements is D. AWS Partner Network (APN).

AWS Partner Network (APN) is a global community of consulting and technology partners that offer a wide range of services and solutions for AWS customers. APN partners can help customers design, architect, build, migrate, and manage their workloads and applications on AWS.APN partners have access to various resources, training, tools, and support to enhance their AWS expertise and deliver value to customers12.

AWS Support is a service that provides technical assistance and guidance for AWS customers. AWS Support offers different plans with varying levels of response time, access channels, and features.AWS Support does not directly engage third-party consultants, but rather connects customers with AWS experts and resources3.

AWS Organizations is a service that allows customers to manage multiple AWS accounts within a single organization. AWS Organizations enables customers to create groups of accounts, apply policies, automate account creation, and consolidate billing.AWS Organizations does not directly engage third-party consultants, but rather helps customers simplify and optimize their AWS account management4.

AWS Service Catalog is a service that allows customers to create and manage catalogs of IT services that are approved for use on AWS. AWS Service Catalogenables customers to control the configuration, deployment, and governance of their IT services.AWS Service Catalog does not directly engage third-party consultants, but rather helps customers standardize and streamline their IT service delivery5.

 Operations is an option that is a perspective that includes foundational capabilities of the AWS Cloud Adoption Framework (AWS CAF). Operations is one of the six perspectives of the AWS CAF, along with business, people, governance, platform, and security. Operations focuses on the processes and procedures to support the ongoing management and maintenance of the cloud-based IT assets. It covers topics such as monitoring, backup and recovery, change management, incident management, and automation5. Sustainability is not a perspective of the AWS CAF, but a concept that refers to the ability of a system to operate in an environmentally friendly and socially responsible manner. Performance efficiency is not a perspective of the AWS CAF, but a pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework. It focuses on using the right resources and services for the workload, monitoring performance, and continuously improving the efficiency of the solution. Reliability is not a perspective of the AWS CAF, but a pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework. It focuses on the ability of a system to recover from infrastructure or service disruptions, dynamically acquire computing resources to meet demand, and mitigate disruptions such as misconfigurations or transient network issues.

 Patch management and configuration management are controls that are the responsibility of both AWS and AWS customers, according to the AWS shared responsibility model. Patch management is the process of applying updates to software and applications to fix vulnerabilities, bugs, or performance issues. Configuration management is the process of defining and maintaining the settings and parameters of systems and applications to ensure their consistency and reliability. AWS is responsible for patching and configuring the software and services that it manages, such as the AWS global infrastructure, the hypervisor, and the AWS managed services. The customer is responsible for patching and configuring the software and services that they manage, such as the guest operating system, the applications, and the AWS customer-managed services. Physical and environmental controls are the responsibility of AWS, according to the AWS shared responsibility model. Physical and environmental controls are the measures that protect the physical security and availability of the AWS global infrastructure, such as power, cooling, fire suppression, and access control. AWS is responsible for maintaining these controls and ensuring the resilience and reliability of the AWS Cloud. Account structures are the responsibility of the customer, according to the AWS shared responsibility model. Account structures are the ways that customers organize and manage their AWS accounts and resources, such as using AWS Organizations, IAM users and roles, resource tagging, and billing preferences. The customer is responsible for creating and configuring these structures and ensuring the security and governance of their AWS environment. Choice of the AWS Region where data is stored is the responsibility of the customer, according to the AWS sharedresponsibility model. AWS Regions are geographic areas that consist of multiple isolated Availability Zones. Customers can choose which AWS Region to store their data and run their applications, depending on their latency, compliance, and cost requirements. The customer is responsible for selecting the appropriate AWS Region and ensuring the data sovereignty and regulatory compliance of their data.

 Using EC2 instances across multiple Availability Zones in the same AWS Region is a solution that meets the requirements of sharing the same geographic area but using redundant underlying power sources. Availability Zones are isolated locations within an AWS Region that have independent power, cooling, and physical security. They are connected through low-latency, high-throughput, and highly redundant networking. By launching EC2 instances in different Availability Zones, users can increase the fault tolerance and availability of their applications. Amazon CloudFront is a contentdelivery network (CDN) service that speeds up the delivery of web content and media to end users by caching it at the edge locations closer to them. It is not a database service and cannot be used to store operational data for EC2 instances. Edge locations are sites that are part of the Amazon CloudFront network and are located in many cities around the world. They are not the same as Availability Zones and do not provide redundancy for EC2 instances. AWS OpsWorks is a configuration management service that allows users to automate the deployment and management of applications using Chef or Puppet. It can be used to create stacks that span multiple AWS Regions, but this would not meet the requirement of sharing the same geographic area.

 Create annotated documentation is the design principle that is included in the operational excellence pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework. According to the AWS Well-Architected Framework whitepaper, creating annotated documentation means "documenting your workload so that the team understands the architecture, how to operate the workload, and how the workload delivers value to customers."3 Anticipate failure, ensure performance efficiency, and optimize costs are design principles that belong to other pillars of the AWS Well-Architected Framework, such as reliability, performance efficiency, and cost optimization.

AWS Budgets is a service that enables you to plan your service usage, service costs, and instance reservations. You can use AWS Budgets to create custom budgets that alert you when your costs or usage exceed (or are forecasted to exceed) your budgeted amount. You can also use AWS Budgets to monitor how close your usage and costs are to meeting your reservation purchases1

AWS Network Firewall is a managed service that makes it easy to deploy essential network protections for all of your Amazon Virtual Private Clouds (VPCs). The service can be set up with just a few clicks from the AWS console or using APIs. AWS Network Firewall automatically scales with your network traffic, so you don’t have to worry about deploying and managing any infrastructure. AWS Network Firewall provides protection from common network threats such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting, and DDoS attacks1.

 AWS Shield Advanced is a managed Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) protection service that safeguards applications running on AWS. AWS Shield Advanced provides you with 24x7 access to the AWS DDoS Response Team (DRT) and protection against DDoS attacks of any size or duration. AWS Shield Advanced also provides near real-time visibility into attacks, advanced attack mitigation capabilities, and integration with AWS WAF and AWS Firewall Manager1. AWS Shield is a standard service that provides always-on detection and automatic inline mitigations to minimize application downtime and latency, but it does not offer the same level of features and support as AWS Shield Advanced2. Amazon GuardDuty is a threat detection service that continuously monitors for malicious activity and unauthorized behavior, but it does not provide DDoS protection3. Network ACLs are stateless filters that can be associated with a subnet to control the traffic to and from the subnet, but they are not designed to protect against DDoS attacks

Moving to the AWS Cloud offers several advantages, including increased speed and agility, which allows users to experiment, innovate, and iterate faster by using the global AWS infrastructure. Additionally, AWS offers massive economies of scale due to its large customer base, leading to lower pay-as-you-go prices. AWS does not assume all responsibilities for the security of infrastructure and applications; it follows a shared responsibility model. Also, not all AWS services can be implemented in seconds, and physical hardware cannot be moved from a user’s data center to the AWS Cloud.

Amazon Textract is a service that automatically extracts text and data from scanned documents. Amazon Textract goes beyond simple optical character recognition (OCR) to also identify thecontents of fields in forms and information stored in tables. Amazon Textract can analyze images of scanned financial invoices and extract the total balance amounts, as well as other relevant information, such as invoice number, date, vendor name, etc5.

AWS Application Discovery Service is a service that helps you plan your migration to the AWS Cloud by collecting usage and configuration data about your on-premises servers and databases. This data includes information such as the hostname, IP address, and MAC address of each server, as well as the performance metrics, network connections, and processes running on them. You can use AWS Application Discovery Service to discover your on-premises inventory, map the dependencies between servers and applications, and estimate the cost and effort of migrating to AWS. You can also export the data to other AWS services, such as AWS Migration Hub and AWS Database Migration Service, to support your migration tasks. AWS Application Discovery Service offers two ways of performing discovery: agentless discovery and agent-based discovery. Agentless discovery uses a virtual appliance that you deploy on your VMware vCenter to collect data from your virtual machines and hosts. Agent-based discovery uses an agent that you install on each of your physical or virtual servers to collect data. You can choose the method that best suits your environment and needs. AWS DataSync is a service that helps you transfer data between your on-premises storage and AWS storage services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon EFS, and Amazon FSx for Windows File Server. AWS DataSync does not collect information about your on-premises infrastructure, but rather focuses on optimizing the data transfer speed, security, and reliability. AWS Application Migration Service is a service that helps you migrate your applications from your on-premises or cloud environment to AWS without making any changes to the applications, their architecture, or the migrated servers. AWS Application Migration Service does not collect information about your on-premises infrastructure, but rather uses a lightweight agent to replicate your servers as Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) and launch them as EC2 instances on AWS. AWS Database Migration Service is a service that helps you migrate your databases from your on-premises or cloud environment to AWS, either as a one-time migration or as a continuous replication. AWS Database MigrationService does not collect information about your on-premises infrastructure, but rather uses a source and a target endpoint to connect to your databases and transfer the data. References: AWS Application Discovery Service, AWS DataSync, AWS Application Migration Service, [AWS Database Migration Service]

Cost optimization is one of the five pillars of the AWS Well-Architected Framework. It focuses on avoiding unnecessary costs, understanding and controlling where money is being spent, selecting the most appropriate and right number of resource types, analyzing spend over time, and scaling to meet business needs without overspending.

The scenario represents the operational excellence pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework, which focuses on running and monitoring systems to deliver business value and continually improve supporting processes and procedures1. Security, performance efficiency, cost optimization, and reliability are the other four pillars of the framework1.

AWS customer carbon footprint tool is a tool that helps customers measure and manage their carbon emissions from their AWS usage. It provides data on the carbon intensity, energy consumption, and estimated emissions of AWS services across regions and time periods. It alsoenables customers to review and forecast their emissions, and compare them with industry benchmarks. AWS Health Dashboard is a service that provides personalized information about the health and performance of AWS services and resources. AWS Support Center is a service that provides access to AWS support resources, such as cases, forums, and documentation. Amazon QuickSight is a service that provides business intelligence and analytics for AWS data sources.

On-Demand Instances are the default pricing model for Amazon EC2 instances. They allow users to pay for compute capacity by the second, with no long-term commitments or upfront payments. They are suitable for applications with short-term, irregular, or unpredictable workloads that cannot beinterrupted3. Savings Plans are a pricing model that offer significant savings on Amazon EC2 and AWS Fargate usage, in exchange for a commitment to a consistent amount of usage (measured in $/hour) for a 1-year or 3-year term. Spot Instances are a pricing model that offer spare Amazon EC2 compute capacity at up to 90% discount compared to On-Demand prices, but they can be interrupted by AWS with a two-minute notice when the demand exceeds the supply. Reserved Instances are a pricing model that offer up to 75% discount compared to On-Demand prices, in exchange for a commitment to use a specific instance type and size in a specific region for a 1-year or 3-year term.

 Amazon CloudFront is a fast content delivery network (CDN) service that securely delivers data, videos, applications, and APIs to customers globally with low latency, high transfer speeds, all within a developer-friendly environment. CloudFront can cache web server content in edge locations, which are located closer to the end users, toimprove the web service’s performance globally2.

The AWS Enterprise Support Concierge team is a group of billing and account experts who specialize in working with enterprise customers. They can help customers with questions about billing, account management, cost optimization, and other non-technical issues. They can also assist customers with navigating and optimizing their AWS environment, such as setting up consolidated billing, applying for service limit increases, or requesting refunds.

AWS Cloud Development Kit (AWS CDK) is a software development framework that allows you to define cloud resources as code using familiar programming languages, such as TypeScript, Python, Java, .NET, and Go (in Developer Preview). You can use AWS CDK to model your application resources using high-level constructs that provide sensible defaults and best practices, or use low-level constructs that provide full access to the underlying AWS CloudFormation resources. AWS CDK synthesizes your code into AWS CloudFormation templates that you can deploy using the AWS CDK CLI or the AWS Management Console. AWS CDK also integrates with other AWS services, such as AWS CodeCommit, AWS CodeBuild, AWS CodePipeline, AWS Lambda, Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, and more, to help you automate your development and deployment processes. AWS CDK is an open-source framework that you can extend and contribute to. References: Cloud Development Framework - AWS Cloud Development Kit - AWS, AWS Cloud Development Kit Documentation, AWS Cloud Development Kit - Wikipedia, AWS CDK Intro Workshop | AWS CDK Workshop

Volume-based discounts are an AWS offering or benefit that can help the company optimize costs based on the amount of storage that the company uses. Volume-based discounts are discounts that AWS provides for some storage services, such as Amazon S3 and Amazon EBS, when the company stores a large amount of data. The more data the company stores, the lower the price per GB. For example, Amazon S3 offers six storage classes, each with a different price per GB. The price per GB decreases as the amount of data stored in each storage class increases

AWS Outposts is a fully managed service that extends AWS infrastructure, AWS services, APIs, and tools to virtually any datacenter, co-location space, or on-premises facility for a truly consistent hybrid experience1. AWS Outposts enables customers to run workloads on premises using the same AWS APIs, tools, and services that they use in the cloud2. Dedicated Hosts are physical servers with EC2 instance capacity fully dedicated to a customer’s use3. Availability Zones are one or more discrete data centers, each with redundant power, networking, and connectivity, housed in separate facilities within an AWS Region4. AWS Wavelength is an AWS Infrastructure offering optimized for mobile edge computing applications.

Amazon DynamoDB is a key-value and document database that delivers single-digit millisecond performance at any scale. It is a fully managed, serverless database that does not require provisioning, patching, or backup. It offers built-in security, backup and restore, and in-memory caching3. Amazon RDS is a relational database service that makes it easy to set up, operate, and scale a relational database in the cloud. It provides cost-efficient and resizable capacity while automating time-consuming administration tasks such as hardware provisioning, database setup, patching, and backups. However, it is not a key-value NoSQL database, and it is not serverless, as it requires you to choose an instance type and size4. Amazon Aurora is a MySQL and PostgreSQL-compatible relational database built for the cloud, that combines the performance and availability of traditional enterprise databases with the simplicity and cost-effectiveness of open source databases. However, it is also not a key-value NoSQL database, and it is not serverless, as it requires you to choose an instance type and size. Amazon MemoryDB for Redis is a Redis-compatible, durable, in-memory database service that delivers ultra-fast performance and multi-AZ reliability for the most demanding applications. However, it is also not a key-value NoSQL database, and it is not serverless, as it requires you to choose a node type and size.

 Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive is a storage class within Amazon S3 that provides the lowest-cost, long-term data storage for data that is rarely accessed. AWS Snowball is a service that provides aphysical device for transferring large amounts of data into and out of AWS. Amazon MQ is a service that provides managed message broker service for Apache ActiveMQ. AWS Storage Gateway is a service that provides hybrid cloud storage for on-premises applications.

AWS Glue is a fully managed extract, transform, and load (ETL) service that makes it easy to prepare and load data for analytics. AWS Glue can discover data sources, transform data, and make it available for analysis by using data catalogs and workflows. Amazon Redshift is a fully managed, petabyte-scale data warehouse service in the cloud that enables customers to analyze data using standard SQL and existing business intelligence tools. Amazon Redshift can also integrate with other AWS services to visualize and transform data. Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS) provides a simple, scalable, fully managed elastic NFS file system for use with AWS Cloud services and on-premises resources. Amazon QuickSight is a fast, cloud-powered business intelligence service that makes it easy to deliver insights to everyone in an organization. Amazon Quantum Ledger Database (Amazon QLDB) is a fully managed ledger database that provides a transparent, immutable, and cryptographically verifiable transaction log owned by a central trusted authority.

Amazon Lightsail is an easy-to-use cloud platform that offers everything you need to build an application or website, plus a cost-effective, monthly plan1. It is designed for developers who have little or no prior cloud experience and want to launch and manage applications on AWS with minimal complexity2. Amazon SageMaker is a service for building, training, and deploying machine learning models3. AWS Lambda is a service that lets you run code without provisioning or managing servers4. Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS) is a fully managed container orchestration service.

Amazon Neptune is a service that provides a fully managed graph database that supports property graphs and RDF graphs. It can be used to build applications that work with highly connected datasets, such as shopping recommendations, social networks, fraud detection, and knowledge graphs2. Amazon DynamoDB is a service that provides a fully managed NoSQL database that delivers fast and consistent performance at any scale. Amazon Aurora is a service that provides a fully managed relational database that is compatible with MySQL and PostgreSQL. Amazon DocumentDB (with MongoDB compatibility) is a service that provides a fully managed document database that is compatible with MongoDB.

An internet gateway is a service that allows for internet traffic to enter into a VPC. Otherwise, a VPC is completely segmented off and then the only way to get to it is potentially through a VPN connection rather than through internet connection. An internet gateway is a logical connection between an AWS VPC and the internet. It supports IPv4 and IPv6 traffic. It does not cause availability risks or bandwidth constraints on your network traffic1. An internet gateway enables resources in your public subnets (such as EC2 instances) to connect to the internet if the resource has a public IPv4 address or an IPv6 address. Similarly, resources on the internet can initiate a connection to resources in your subnet using the public IPv4 address or IPv6 address2. An internet gateway also provides a target in your VPC route tables for internet-routable traffic. For communication using IPv4, the internet gateway also performs network address translation (NAT). For communication using IPv6, NAT is not needed because IPv6 addresses are public2. To enable access to or from the internet for instances in a subnet in a VPC using an internet gateway, you must create an internet gateway and attach it to your VPC, add a route to your subnet’s route table that directs internet-bound traffic to the internet gateway, ensure thatinstances in your subnet have a public IPv4 address or an IPv6 address, and ensure that your network access control lists and security group rules allow the desired internet traffic to flow to and from your instance2. References: Connect to the internet using an internet gateway, AWS Internet Gateway and VPC Routing

AWS Outposts is an AWS service that extends AWS infrastructure, services, APIs, and tools to virtually any datacenter, co-location space, or on-premises facility. AWS Outposts enables you to run Amazon EC2 instances and other AWS services locally, while maintaining a consistent and seamless connection to the AWS Cloud. AWS Outposts is ideal for workloads that require low latency, local data processing, or data residency. By using AWS Outposts, the company can process personallyidentifiable information (PII) and keep data in the country where it was generated, while leveraging the benefits of AWS

AWS Config is a service that enables you to assess, audit, and evaluate the configurations of your AWS resources. AWS Config continuously monitors and records your AWS resource configurations and allows you to automate the evaluation of recorded configurations against desired configurations. With AWS Config, you can review changes in configurations and relationships between AWS resources, dive into detailed resource configuration histories, and determine your overall compliance against the configurations specified in your internal guidelines. This can help you simplify compliance auditing, security analysis, change management, and operational troubleshooting1.

AWS Trusted Advisor is an online tool that provides you real time guidance to help you provision your resources following AWS best practices, including security and performance. It can help you monitor for misconfigured security groups that are allowing unrestricted access to specific ports. Amazon CloudWatch is a service that monitors your AWS resources and the applications you run on AWS. Amazon GuardDuty is a threat detection service that continuously monitors for maliciousactivity and unauthorized behavior. AWS Health Dashboard provides relevant and timely information to help you manage events in progress, and provides proactive notification to help you plan for scheduled activities.

Migration Evaluator is an AWS service that provides a customized assessment of your current on-premises environment and helps you build a data-driven business case for migration to AWS. Migration Evaluator collects and analyzes data from your on-premises servers, such as CPU, memory, disk, network, and utilization metrics, and compares them with the most cost-effective AWS alternatives. Migration Evaluator also helps you understand your existing software licenses and running costs, and provides recommendations for Bring Your Own License (BYOL) and License Included (LI) options in AWS. Migration Evaluator generates a detailed report that shows your projected running costs in the AWS Cloud, along with potential savings and benefits. You can use this report to support your decision-making and planning for cloud migration. References: Cloud Business Case & Migration Plan - Amazon Migration Evaluator - AWS, Getting started with Migration Evaluator

 Amazon Redshift is a fully managed, petabyte-scale data warehouse service in the cloud. You can start with just a few hundred gigabytes of data and scale to a petabyte or more. This enables you to use your data to acquire new insights for your business and customers. Amazon Redshift is a relational database management system (RDBMS), so it is compatible with other RDBMS applications. You can use standard SQL to query the data.

Availability Zones are components of AWS infrastructure that can help the company ensure that the application is highly resilient. Availability Zones are multiple, isolated locations within each AWS Region. Each Availability Zone has independent power, cooling, and physical security, and is connected to the other Availability Zones in the same Region via low-latency, high-throughput, and highly redundant networking. Availability Zones allow you to operate production applications and databases that are more highly available, fault tolerant, and scalable than would be possible from a single data center. 

This is the AWS service or resource that will meet the requirements of distributing traffic between the Amazon EC2 instances that host the website. Application Load Balancer is a type of Elastic Load Balancing that distributes incoming application traffic across multiple targets, such as Amazon EC2 instances, containers, IP addresses, and Lambda functions. Application Load Balancer operates at the application layer (layer 7) of the OSI model and supports advanced features such as path-based routing, host-based routing, health checks, and SSL termination. You can learn more about Application Load Balancer from [this webpage] or [this digital course].

AWS Business Support is the least expensive AWS Support plan that provides the full set of AWS Trusted Advisor best practice checks for cost optimization. AWS Trusted Advisor is a service that provides best practices and recommendations for cost optimization, performance, security, and fault tolerance. AWS Business Support also provides other benefits, such as 24/7 technical support, unlimited cases, and faster response times. AWS Enterprise Support is the most expensive AWS Support plan that provides the same benefits as AWS Business Support, plus additional benefits, such as a technical account manager and enterprise concierge support. AWS Developer Support and AWS Basic Support are cheaper AWS Support plans that provide only a limited set of AWS Trusted Advisor best practice checks for cost optimization .

The AWS service that provides the ability to manage infrastructure as code is AWS CloudFormation. Infrastructure as code is a process of defining and provisioning AWS resources using code or templates, rather than manual actions or scripts. AWS CloudFormation allows you to create and update stacks of AWS resources based on predefined templates that describe the desired state and configuration of the resources. AWS CloudFormation automates and simplifies the deployment and management of AWS resources, and ensures consistency and repeatability across different environments and regions. AWS CloudFormation also supports rollback, change sets, drift detection, and nested stacks features that help you to monitor and control the changes to your infrastructure1.

The AWS account root user is the identity that has complete access to all AWS services and resources in the account. It is accessed by signing in with the email address and password that were used to create the account1. The root user should be protected and used only for a few account and service management tasks that require it1. Therefore, the following actions are best practices for an AWS account root user:

Enable multi-factor authentication (MFA) on the root user. MFA is a security feature that requires users to provide two or more pieces of information to authenticate themselves, such as a password and a code from a device. MFA adds an extra layer of protection for the root user credentials, which can access sensitive information and perform critical operations in the account2.

Create an IAM user with administrator privileges for daily administrative tasks, instead of using the root user. IAM is a service that helps customers manage access to AWS resources for users and groups. Customers can create IAM users and assign them permissions to perform specific tasks on specific resources. Customers can also create IAM roles and policies to delegate access to other AWS services or external entities3. By creating an IAM user with administrator privileges, customers can avoid using the root user for everyday tasks and reduce the risk of accidental or malicious changes to the account1.

The correct answer is D because AWS Enterprise Support is the support plan that provides customers with access to an AWS technical account manager (TAM). AWS Enterprise Support is the highest level of support plan offered by AWS, and it provides customers with the most comprehensive and personalized support experience. An AWS TAM is a dedicated technical resource who works closely with customers to understand their business and technical needs, provide proactive guidance, and coordinate support across AWS teams. The other options are incorrect because they are not support plans that provide customers with access to an AWS TAM. AWS Basic Support is the default and free support plan that provides customers with access to online documentation, forums, and account information. AWS Developer Support is the lowest level of paid support plan that provides customers with access to technical support during business hours, general guidance, and best practice recommendations. AWS Business Support is the intermediate level of paid support plan that provides customers with access to technical support 24/7, system health checks, architectural guidance, and case management. Reference: AWS Support Plans

Provisioning additional EC2 instances in other Availability Zones is a way to make the application highly available, as it reduces the impact of failures and increases fault tolerance. Configuring an Application Load Balancer and assigning the EC2 instance as the ALB’s target is a way to distribute traffic among multiple instances, but it does not make the application highly available if there is only one instance. Using an Amazon Machine Image to create the EC2 instance is a way to launch a virtual server with a preconfigured operating system and software, but it does not make the application highly available by itself. Provisioning the application by using an EC2 Spot Instance is a way to use spare EC2 capacity at up to 90% off the On-Demand price, but it does not make the application highly available, as Spot Instances can be interrupted by EC2 with a two-minute notification.

The correct answer is A because Amazon CloudFront is an AWS service that provides secure delivery of data, videos, applications, and APIs to users globally with low latency and high transfer speeds. Amazon CloudFront is a fast content delivery network (CDN) that integrates with other AWS services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon EC2, AWS Lambda, and AWS Shield. Amazon CloudFront delivers content through a worldwide network of edge locations that are located close to the end users. The other options are incorrect because they are not AWS services that provide secure delivery of data, videos, applications, and APIs to users globally with low latency and high transfer speeds. Elastic Load Balancing is an AWS service that distributes incoming traffic across multiple targets, such as Amazon EC2 instances, containers, and IP addresses. Amazon S3 is an AWS service that provides object storage for data of any size and type. Amazon Elastic Transcoder is an AWS service that converts media files from their original source format into different formats that will play on various devices. Reference: Amazon CloudFront FAQs

AWS WAF is the AWS service that the company should use to configure rules to identify threats and protect applications from malicious network access. AWS WAF is a web application firewall that helps to filter, monitor, and block malicious web requests based on customizable rules. AWS WAF can be integrated with other AWS services, such as Amazon CloudFront, Amazon API Gateway, and Application Load Balancer. For more information, see What is AWS WAF? and How AWS WAF Works.

Amazon GuardDuty is a service that provides intelligent threat detection and continuous monitoring for the AWS environment. It analyzes network and account activity using machine learning and threat intelligence to identify potential security threats, such as unauthorized access, compromised credentials, malicious hosts, and reconnaissance activities. It also generates detailed and actionable findings that can be viewed on the AWS Management Console or sent to other AWS services, such as Amazon CloudWatch Events and AWS Lambda, for further analysis or remediation. Amazon GuardDuty OverviewAWS Certified Cloud Practitioner - aws.amazon.com

 AWS Abuse team is the AWS group or team that the company should notify if it suspects that its AWS resources are being used for illegal activities. AWS Abuse team is a dedicated team that handles reports of abuse, such as spam, phishing, malware, denial-of-service attacks, and unauthorized access, involving AWS resources. The company can contact the AWS Abuse team byfilling out the [Report Abuse of AWS Resources form] or sending an email to abuse@amazonaws.com. The company should provide as much information as possible, such as the source and destination IP addresses, timestamps, log files, and screenshots, to help the AWS Abuse team investigate and take appropriate actions. For more information, see [Reporting Abuse] and [AWS Acceptable Use Policy].

The company should use AWS WAF to safeguard the website from SQL injection or cross-site scripting. AWS WAF is a web application firewall that helps protect web applications from common web exploits that could affect availability, compromise security, or consume excessive resources. The company can use AWS WAF to create custom rules that block malicious requests that match certain patterns, such as SQL injection or cross-site scripting. AWS WAF can be applied to web applications that are behind an Application Load Balancer, Amazon CloudFront, or Amazon API Gateway. Amazon GuardDuty, AWS Trusted Advisor, and Amazon Inspector are not the best services to use for this purpose. Amazon GuardDuty is a threat detection service that monitors for malicious activity and unauthorized behavior across the AWS accounts and resources. AWS Trusted Advisor is a service that provides best practice recommendations for cost optimization, performance, security, and fault tolerance. Amazon Inspector is a service that assesses the security and compliance of applications running on Amazon EC2 instances12

The architecture concept of the AWS Cloud that meets the requirements of the company that wants to migrate to the AWS Cloud and needs the ability to acquire and release resources as needed is elasticity. Elasticity means that AWS customers can quickly and easily provision and scale up or down AWS resources as their demand changes, without any upfront costs or long-term commitments. AWS provides various tools and services that enable customers to achieve elasticity, such as Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling, Amazon CloudWatch, and AWS CloudFormation. Elasticity helps customers optimize their performance, availability, and cost efficiency. Availability, reliability, and durability are other architecture concepts of the AWS Cloud, but they are not directly related to the ability to acquire and release resources as needed. Availability means that AWS customers can access their AWS resources and applications whenever and wherever they need them. Reliability means that AWS customers can depend on their AWS resources and applications to functioncorrectly and consistently. Durability means that AWS customers can preserve their data and objects for long periods of time without loss or corruption12

Amazon RDS is the AWS service that will meet the requirements of using a managed service to simplify the setup, operation, and scaling of a MySQL database in the AWS Cloud. Amazon RDS is a relational database service that supports MySQL and other popular database engines. Amazon RDS handles routine database tasks such as provisioning, patching, backup, recovery, and scaling. Amazon RDS also offers high availability, security, and compatibility features3

 The correct answer is B because security groups are AWS features that act as instance-level firewalls to control inbound and outbound access. Security groups are virtual firewalls that can be attached to one or more Amazon EC2 instances. Users can configure rules for security groups to allow or deny traffic based on protocols, ports, and source or destination IP addresses. The other options are incorrect because they are not AWS features that act as instance-level firewalls to control inbound and outbound access. Network access control list is an AWS feature that acts as a subnet-level firewall to control inbound and outbound access. AWS Trusted Advisor is an AWS service that provides real-time guidance to help users follow AWS best practices for security, performance, cost optimization, and fault tolerance. Virtual private gateways are AWS features that enable users to create a secure and encrypted connection between their VPC and their on-premises network. Reference: Security Groups for Your VPC

 AWS offers different support plans to meet the needs of different customers. The AWS Enterprise Support plan is the highest level of support that provides customers with concierge-like service, where the main focus is helping them achieve their outcomes and find success in the cloud. One of the benefits of the AWS Enterprise Support plan is that customers get designated support from an AWS technical account manager (TAM), who provides consultative architectural and operational guidance based on their applications and use cases. Therefore, the correct answer is B. You can learn more about AWS support plans and their benefits .

Amazon Redshift is the service that meets the requirements of using standard SQL to query and combine exabytes of structured and semi-structured data across a data warehouse, operational database, and data lake. Amazon Redshift is a fully managed, petabyte-scale data warehouse service that allows you to run complex analytic queries using standard SQL and your existing business intelligence tools. Amazon Redshift also supports Redshift Spectrum, a feature that allows you to directly query and join data stored in Amazon S3 using the same SQL syntax. Amazon Redshift can scale up or down to handle any volume of data and deliver fast query performance5

The costs that the company will eliminate with this migration are the cost of application licensing and the cost of physical server hardware. The cost of application licensing is the fee that the company has to pay to use the software applications on its on-premises servers. The cost of physical server hardware is the expense that the company has to incur to purchase, maintain, and upgrade the servers and related equipment. By migrating to the AWS Cloud, the company can avoid these costs by using the AWS services and resources that are already licensed and managed by AWS. For more information, see [Cloud Economics] and [AWS Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) Calculator].

 The AWS account root user is the first sign-in identity that is available when an AWS account is created. It has complete access to all AWS services and resources in the account. The root user email address and password are the same credentials that are used to sign in to the AWS Management Console4. The root user should be used only to perform a few account and servicemanagement tasks. For day-to-day tasks, it is recommended to use AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) users or roles instead.

 The AWS tool that will meet the requirements of the company that is planning a migration to the AWS Cloud and wants to examine the costs that are associated with different workloads is AWS Pricing Calculator. AWS Pricing Calculator is a tool that helps customers estimate the cost of using AWS services based on their requirements and preferences. The company can use AWS Pricing Calculator to compare the costs of different AWS services and configurations, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, Amazon RDS, and more. AWS Pricing Calculator also provides detailed breakdowns of the cost components, such as compute, storage, network, and data transfer. AWS Pricing Calculator helps customers plan and optimize their cloud budget and migration strategy. AWS Budgets, AWS Cost Explorer, and AWS Cost and Usage Report are not the best tools to use for this purpose. AWSBudgets is a tool that helps customers monitor and manage their AWS spending and usage against predefined budget limits and thresholds. AWS Cost Explorer is a tool that helps customers analyze and visualize their AWS spending and usage trends over time. AWS Cost and Usage Report is a tool that helps customers access comprehensive and granular information about their AWS costs and usage in a CSV or Parquet file. These tools are more useful for tracking and optimizing the existing AWS costs and usage, rather than estimating the costs of different workloads34

Testing recovery procedures is the design principle that is achieved by following the reliability pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework. The reliability pillar focuses on the ability of a system to recover from failures and prevent disruptions. Testing recovery procedures helps to ensure that the system can handle different failure scenarios and restore normal operations as quickly as possible. Testing recovery procedures also helps to identify and mitigate any risks or gaps in the system design and implementation. For more information, see [Reliability Pillar] and [Testing for Reliability].

 Server-side encryption with Amazon S3 managed encryption keys (SSE-S3) and server-side encryption with AWS KMS managed keys (SSE-KMS) are the encryption types that can be used to protect objects at rest in Amazon S3. Server-side encryption means that Amazon S3 encrypts the objects before saving them on disks and decrypts them when they are downloaded. SSE-S3 uses one master key per bucket that is managed by Amazon S3. SSE-KMS uses a customer master key (CMK) that is stored in AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS) and provides additional benefits, such as audit trails and key rotation. For more information, see Protecting Data Using Server-Side Encryption and Protecting Data Using Encryption.

The user authentication services managed by AWS are: Amazon Cognito and AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM). These services help users securely manage and control access to their AWS resources and applications. Amazon Cognito is a service that provides user sign-up, sign-in, and access control for web and mobile applications. Amazon Cognito supports various identity providers, such as Facebook, Google, and Amazon, as well as custom user pools. AWS IAM is a service that enables users to create and manage users, groups, roles, and permissions for AWS services and resources. AWS IAM supports various authentication methods, such as passwords, access keys, and multi-factorauthentication (MFA)

AWS Secrets Manager is a service that helps you protect access to your applications, services, and IT resources. This service enables you to easily rotate, manage, and retrieve database credentials, API keys, and other secrets throughout their lifecycle1. Amazon S3 is a storage service that does not offer automatic rotation of credentials. AWS Systems Manager Parameter Store is a service that provides secure, hierarchical storage for configuration data management and secrets management2, but it does not offer automatic rotation of credentials. AWS CloudTrail is a service that enables governance, compliance, operational auditing, and risk auditing of your AWS account3, but it does not store or rotate credentials.

 AWS Organizations helps to centrally manage billing and allow controlled access to resources across AWS accounts. AWS Organizations is a service that enables the user to consolidate multiple AWS accounts into an organization that can be managed as a single unit. AWS Organizations allows the user to create groups of accounts and apply policies to them, such as service control policies (SCPs) that specify the services and actions that users and roles can access in the accounts. AWS Organizations also enables the user to use consolidated billing, which combines the usage and charges from all the accounts in the organization into a single bill.

Amazon S3 is the AWS service that provides highly durable object storage. Amazon S3 is designed to provide 99.999999999% durability of objects over a given year. This means that you can store your data with high confidence that it will not be lost. Amazon S3 also provides high availability, scalability, security, and performance for your data. You can use Amazon S3 to store and retrieve any amount of data, at any time, from anywhere on the web5.

 Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS) and Amazon FSx offer file storage. File storage is a type of storage that organizes data into files and folders, and allows multiple users or applications to access and share the same files over a network. Amazon EFS is a fully managed, scalable, and elastic file system that supports the Network File System (NFS) protocol and can be used with Amazon EC2 instances and AWS Lambda functions. Amazon FSx is a fully managed service that provides two file system options: Amazon FSx for Windows File Server, which supports the Server Message Block(SMB) protocol and is compatible with Microsoft Windows applications; and Amazon FSx for Lustre, which is a high-performance file system that is optimized for compute-intensive workloads

Amazon Workspaces is the AWS service that provides the functionality of remotely accessing virtual desktop computers from the internet. Amazon Workspaces is a fully managed, secure desktop-as-a-service (DaaS) solution that allows users to provision cloud-based virtual desktops and access them from anywhere, using any supported device. Amazon Workspaces helps users reduce the complexity and cost of managing and maintaining physical desktops, and provides a consistent and secure user experience

 One of the advantages of AWS Cloud computing is that it minimizes variable costs by leveraging economies of scale. This means that AWS can achieve lower costs per unit of computing resources by spreading the fixed costs of building and maintaining data centers over a large number of customers. As a result, AWS can offer lower and more predictable prices to its customers, who only pay for the resources they consume. Therefore, the correct answer is B. You can learn more about AWS pricing and economies of scale

 Amazon Personalize is a fully managed machine learning service that customers can use to generate personalized recommendations for their users. It can also generate user segments based on the users’ affinity for certain items or item metadata. Amazon Personalize uses the customers’ data to train and deploy custom recommendation models that can be integrated into their applications. Therefore, the correct answer is B. You can learn more about Amazon Personalize and its use case.

The correct answer is B because Application Load Balancer is an AWS load balancer that will meet the requirements and take the least amount of effort to deploy. Application Load Balancer is a type of Elastic Load Balancing that operates at the application layer (layer 7) of the OSI model and routes requests to targets based on the content of the request. Application Load Balancer supports advanced features, such as path-based routing, host-based routing, and HTTP header-based routing. The other options are incorrect because they are not AWS load balancers that will meet the requirements and take the least amount of effort to deploy. Network Load Balancer is a type of Elastic Load Balancing that operates at the transport layer (layer 4) of the OSI model and routes requests to targets based on the destination IP address and port. Network Load Balancer does not support path-based routing. AWS OpsWorks Load Balancer is not an AWS load balancer, but rather a feature of AWS OpsWorks that enables users to attach an Elastic Load Balancing load balancer to a layer of their stack. Custom Load Balancer on Amazon EC2 is not an AWS load balancer, but rather a user-defined load balancer that runs on an Amazon EC2 instance. Custom Load Balancer on Amazon EC2 requires more effort to deploy and maintain than an AWS load balancer. Reference: Elastic Load Balancing

 The correct answer is D because AWS Security Hub is a service that aggregates, organizes, and prioritizes security alerts and findings from multiple AWS services, such as Amazon GuardDuty, Amazon Inspector, Amazon Macie, AWS Firewall Manager, and AWS IAM Access Analyzer. The other options are incorrect because they are not services that aggregate security alerts and findings from multiple AWS services. Amazon Detective is a service that helps users analyze and visualize security data to investigate and remediate potential issues. Amazon Inspector is a service that helps users find security vulnerabilities and deviations from best practices in their Amazon EC2 instances. Amazon Macie is a service that helps users discover, classify, and protect sensitive data stored in Amazon S3. Reference: AWS Security Hub FAQs

 According to the AWS shared responsibility model, AWS is responsible for the security of the cloud, while the user is responsible for the security in the cloud. This means that AWS manages the security and maintenance of the underlying infrastructure, such as the servers, networks, and operating systems, while the user manages the security and configuration of the resources and applications that run on AWS. For AWS Lambda functions, the tasks that are the user’s responsibility are:

Establish the IAM permissions that define who can run the Lambda functions. IAM is a service that enables users to manage access and permissions for AWS resources and users. Users can create IAM policies, roles, and users to grant or deny permissions to run Lambda functions, invoke other AWS services, or access AWS resources from Lambda functions. [AWS Lambda Permissions] AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner - aws.amazon.com

Write the code for the Lambda functions to define the application logic. Lambda functions are units of code that can be written in any supported programming language, such as Python, Node.js, Java, or Go. Users can write the code for the Lambda functions using the AWS Management Console, the AWS Command Line Interface (AWS CLI), the AWS SDKs, or any code editor of their choice. Users can also use AWS Lambda Layers to share and manage common code and dependencies across multiple functions. [AWS Lambda Overview] AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner - aws.amazon.com

To achieve high availability in the event of a natural disaster, the company should use EC2 instances in multiple AWS Regions. AWS Regions are geographically isolated areas that consist of multiple Availability Zones. Availability Zones are physically separate locations within an AWS Region that areengineered to be isolated from failures. By using EC2 instances in multiple AWS Regions, the company can ensure that its applications can continue to run even if one Region is affected by a disaster. AWS Global InfrastructureAWS Well-Architected Framework

 AWS CloudTrail is the service that will provide the information about the last time that a specific user accessed the AWS Management Console. AWS CloudTrail is a service that records the API calls and events made by or on behalf of your AWS account. You can use AWS CloudTrail to view, search, and download the history of AWS console sign-in events, which include the user name, date, time, source IP address, and other details of the sign-in activity. Amazon Cognito, Amazon Inspector, and Amazon GuardDuty are not services that will provide this information. Amazon Cognito is a service that provides user authentication and authorization for web and mobile applications. Amazon Inspector is a service that assesses the security and compliance of your applications running on AWS. Amazon GuardDuty is a service that monitors your AWS account and workloads for malicious or unauthorized activity.

 AWS CloudFormation is a service that gives developers and businesses an easy way to create a collection of related AWS and third-party resources, and provision and manage them in an orderly and predictable fashion. You can use AWS CloudFormation’s sample templates or create your own templates to describe the AWS and third-party resources, and any associated dependencies or runtime parameters, required to run your application.

The company should use Amazon RDS with a MySQL database to meet the requirements of moving its workload to AWS so that the tasks of patching the database and taking backup snapshots of the data in the clusters will be completed automatically. Amazon RDS is a managed service that simplifies the setup, operation, and scaling of relational databases in the AWS Cloud. Amazon RDS automates common database administration tasks such as patching, backup, and recovery. Amazon RDS also supports MySQL and other popular database engines5

The pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework that is supported by the goals of protecting AWS Cloud information, systems, and assets while performing risk assessment and mitigation tasks is security. Security is the ability to protect information, systems, and assets while delivering business value through risk assessments and mitigation strategies. The security pillar covers topics such as identity and access management, data protection, infrastructure protection, detective controls, incident response, and compliance

 The AWS service that the company should use for the data warehouse is Amazon Redshift. Amazon Redshift is a fully managed, petabyte-scale data warehouse service that is optimized for analytical queries. It can integrate with various data sources and business intelligence tools to provide fast and cost-effective insights. Amazon Redshift also offers high availability, scalability, security, and compliance features. [Amazon Redshift Overview]

 Access to all AWS resources will be denied if a newly created IAM user has no IAM policy attached and logs in and attempts to view the AWS resources in the account. IAM policies are the way to grant permissions to IAM users, groups, and roles to access and manage AWS resources. By default, IAM users have no permissions, unless they are explicitly granted by an IAM policy. Therefore, a newly created IAM user without any IAM policy attached will not be able to view or perform anyactions on the AWS resources in the account. Access to the AWS billing services and AWS CLI will also be denied, unless the user has the necessary permissions.

The AWS service or feature that the company can use to group users together and apply permissions to the group is AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM). AWS IAM is a service that enables users to create and manage users, groups, roles, and permissions for AWS services and resources. Users can use IAM groups to organize multiple users that have similar access requirements, and attach policies to the groups that define the permissions for the users in the group. This simplifies the management and administration of user access

Amazon RDS supports six database engines: Amazon Aurora, MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL, Oracle, and SQL Server. Apache Cassandra, MongoDB, and Neo4j are not compatible with Amazon RDS. Therefore, the correct answer is D. You can learn more about Amazon RDS and its supported database engines

AWS Cloud Adoption Framework (AWS CAF) is a service or tool that helps users migrate their applications to the AWS Cloud. It provides guidance and best practices to identify and prioritize any business transformation opportunities and evaluate their AWS Cloud readiness. It also helps users align their business and technical perspectives, create an actionable roadmap, and measure their progress. AWS Managed Services (AMS) is a service that provides operational services for AWS infrastructure and applications. It helps users reduce their operational overhead and risk, and focuson their core business. It does not help users identify and prioritize any business transformation opportunities and evaluate their AWS Cloud readiness. AWS Well-Architected Framework is a tool that helps users design and implement secure, high-performing, resilient, and efficient solutions on AWS. It provides a set of questions and best practices across five pillars: operational excellence, security, reliability, performance efficiency, and cost optimization. It does not help users identify and prioritize any business transformation opportunities and evaluate their AWS Cloud readiness. AWS Migration Hub is a service that provides a single location to track and manage the migration of applications to AWS. It helps users discover their on-premises servers, group them into applications, and choose the right migration tools. It does not help users identify and prioritize any business transformation opportunities and evaluate their AWS Cloud readiness.

The correct answer is C because Spot Instances are the pricing model that enables the company to run its existing custom, nonproduction workloads in the AWS Cloud quickly and cost-effectively. Spot Instances are spare Amazon EC2 instances that are available at up to 90% discount compared to On-Demand prices. Spot Instances are suitable for stateless, fault-tolerant, and flexible workloads that can recover from interruptions easily. The other options are incorrect because they are not the pricing model that enables the company to run its existing custom, nonproduction workloads in the AWS Cloud quickly and cost-effectively. Reserved Instances are Amazon EC2 instances that are reserved for a specific period of time (one or three years) in exchange for a lower hourly rate. Reserved Instances are suitable for steady-state or predictable workloads that run for a long duration. On-Demand Instances are Amazon EC2 instances that are launched and billed at a fixed hourly rate. On-Demand Instances are suitable for short-term, irregular, or unpredictable workloads that cannot be interrupted. Dedicated Hosts are physical servers that are dedicated to a single customer. Dedicated Hosts are suitable for workloads that require regulatory compliance or data isolation. Reference: Amazon EC2 Instance Purchasing Options

AWS customers are responsible for enabling encryption of data at rest for Amazon Elastic Block Store (Amazon EBS). Amazon EBS encryption offers a simple encryption solution for your EBSvolumes that does not require you to build, maintain, and secure your own key management infrastructure. You can encrypt both the boot and data volumes of your EC2 instances. You can use AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS) customer master keys (CMKs) or your own CMKs to encrypt your volumes2.

 Availability Zones contain multiple data centers. This is a characteristic of the AWS global infrastructure, which consists of AWS Regions, Availability Zones, and edge locations. AWS Regions are geographically isolated areas that contain multiple Availability Zones. Availability Zones are physically separate locations within an AWS Region that are engineered to be isolated from failures and connected by low-latency, high-throughput, and highly redundant networking. Each Availability Zone contains one or more data centers that house the servers and storage devices that run AWS services. Edge locations are sites that are located closer to the end users and provide caching and content delivery services. AWS Global InfrastructureAWS Certified Cloud Practitioner - aws.amazon.com

Creating an IAM role with the required permissions and attaching the role to the EC2 instance is the most operationally efficient solution to delegate permissions. An IAM role is an entity that defines a set of permissions for making AWS service requests. An IAM role can be assumed by an EC2 instance to access other AWS resources, such as Amazon S3 and Amazon DynamoDB, without having to store any credentials on the instance. This solution is more secure and scalable than using IAM users and their access keys. For more information, see [IAM Roles for Amazon EC2] and [Using an IAM Role to Grant Permissions to Applications Running on Amazon EC2 Instances].

The advantage that users experience when they move on-premises workloads to the AWS Cloud is: elimination of expenses for running and maintaining data centers. By moving on-premises workloads to the AWS Cloud, users can reduce or eliminate the costs associated with owning and operating physical servers, storage, network equipment, and facilities. These costs include hardware purchase, maintenance, repair, power, cooling, security, and staff. Users can also benefit from the pay-as-you-go pricing model of AWS, which allows them to pay only for the resources they use, and scale up or down as needed.

Some of the advantages of using Amazon EC2 instances to host applications in the AWS Cloud instead of on premises are:

EC2 integrates with Amazon VPC, AWS CloudTrail, and AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM). Amazon VPC lets you provision a logically isolated section of the AWS Cloud where you can launch AWS resources in a virtual network that you define. AWS CloudTrail enables governance, compliance, operational auditing, and risk auditing of your AWS account. AWS IAM enables you to manage access to AWS services and resources securely. Therefore, the correct answer is B. You can learn more about Amazon EC2 and its integration with other AWS services

EC2 has a flexible, pay-as-you-go pricing model. You only pay for the compute capacity you use, and you can scale up and down as needed. You can also choose from different pricing options, such as On-Demand, Savings Plans, Reserved Instances, and Spot Instances, to optimize your costs. Therefore, the correct answer is D. You can learn more about Amazon EC2 pricing

The other options are incorrect because:

EC2 does not include operating system patch management. You are responsible for managing and maintaining your own operating systems on EC2 instances. You can use AWS Systems Manager to automate common maintenance tasks, such as applying patches, or use Amazon EC2 Image Builder to create and maintain secure images. Therefore, the incorrect answer is A.

EC2 does not have a 100% service level agreement (SLA). The EC2 SLA guarantees 99.99% availability for each EC2 Region, not for each individual instance. Therefore, the incorrect answer is C.

EC2 does not have automatic storage cost optimization. You are responsible for choosing the right storage option for your EC2 instances, such as Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) or Amazon Elastic File System (EFS), and monitoring and optimizing your storage costs. You can use AWS Cost Explorer or AWS Trusted Advisor to analyze and reduce your storage spending. Therefore, the incorrect answer is E.

An Availability Zone is one or more discrete data centers with redundant power, networking, and connectivity. Availability Zones are part of the AWS global infrastructure, which consists of AWS Regions, Availability Zones, and edge locations. Availability Zones are physically separate locations within an AWS Region that are engineered to be isolated from failures and connected by low-latency, high-throughput, and highly redundant networking. Each Availability Zone contains one or more data centers that house the servers and storage devices that run AWS services. Availability Zones enable users to design and operate fault-tolerant and high-availability applications on AWS. AWS Global InfrastructureAWS Certified Cloud Practitioner - aws.amazon.com

The correct answer is C because Dedicated Hosts are Amazon EC2 instances that are required when a user wants to utilize their existing per-socket, per-core, or per-virtual machine software licenses for a Microsoft Windows server running on AWS. Dedicated Hosts are physical servers that are dedicated to a single customer. Dedicated Hosts allow customers to use their existing server-bound software licenses, such as Windows Server, SQL Server, and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, subject to their license terms. The other options are incorrect because they are not Amazon EC2 instances that are required when a user wants to utilize their existing per-socket, per-core, or per-virtual machine software licenses for a Microsoft Windows server running on AWS. Spot Instances are spare Amazon EC2 instances that are available at up to 90% discount compared to On-Demand prices. Spot Instances are suitable for stateless, fault-tolerant, and flexible workloads that can recover from interruptions easily. Dedicated Instances are Amazon EC2 instances that run on hardware that is dedicated to a single customer, but not to a specific physical server. Dedicated Instances do not allow customers to use their existing server-bound software licenses. Reserved Instances are Amazon EC2 instances that are reserved for a specific period of time (one or three years) in exchange for a lower hourly rate. Reserved Instances are suitable for steady-state or predictable workloads that run for a long duration. Reserved Instances do not allow customers to use their existing server-bound software licenses. Reference: Dedicated Hosts, Amazon EC2 Instance Purchasing Options

The AWS Well-Architected Framework is a set of best practices and guidelines for designing and operating systems in the cloud. The framework consists of five pillars: operational excellence, security, reliability, performance efficiency, and cost optimization. The operational excellence pillar focuses on the ability to run workloads effectively, gain insight into operations, and continuously improve supporting processes and procedures. Therefore, the correct answer is C. You can learn more about the AWS Well-Architected Framework and its pillars.

Amazon RDS is the AWS service that will meet the requirements of migrating a relational database server to the AWS Cloud and minimizing administrative overhead of database maintenance tasks. Amazon RDS is a fully managed relational database service that handles routine database tasks, such as provisioning, patching, backup, recovery, failure detection, and repair. Amazon RDS supports several database engines, such as MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, SQL Server, and Amazon Aurora5.

A benefit of decoupling an AWS Cloud architecture is the ability to upgrade components independently. Decoupling is a way of designing systems to reduce interdependencies and minimize the impact of changes. Decoupling allows components to interact with each other through well-defined interfaces, rather than direct references. This reduces the risk of failures and errors propagating across the system, and enables greater scalability, availability, and maintainability. By decoupling an AWS Cloud architecture, the user can upgrade or modify one component without affecting the other components5.

 The correct answer is C because Amazon Cognito provides identity federation and user authentication for web and mobile applications. Amazon Cognito allows users to sign in with their social media, email, or online shopping accounts. The other options are incorrect because they do not provide identity federation or user authentication. AWS IAM Identity Center (AWS Single Sign-On) is a service that enables users to access multiple AWS accounts and applications with a single sign-on experience. AWS Config is a service that enables users to assess, audit, and evaluate the configurations of their AWS resources. AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) is a service that enables users to manage access to AWS resources using users, groups, roles, and policies. Reference: Amazon Cognito FAQs

 The duties that are the responsibility of a company that is using AWS Lambda are security inside of code and writing and updating of code. AWS Lambda is a serverless compute service that allows you to run code without provisioning or managing servers, scaling, or patching. AWS Lambda takes care of the security of the underlying infrastructure, such as the operating system, the network, and the firewall. However, the company is still responsible for the security of the code itself, such as encrypting sensitive data, validating input, and handling errors. The company is also responsible for writing and updating the code that defines the Lambda function, and choosing the runtime environment, such as Node.js, Python, or Java. AWS Lambda does not require the selection of CPU resources, as it automatically allocates them based on the memory configuration34

The statement that is true regarding pricing for these eight instances is: four instances will be charged as RIs, and four will be charged as regular instances. Amazon EC2 Reserved Instances (RIs) are a pricing model that allows users to reserve EC2 instances for a specific term and benefit from discounted hourly rates and capacity reservation. RIs are purchased for a specific AWS Region, and can be shared across multiple accounts in an organization in AWS Organizations for consolidated billing. However, RIs are applied on a first-come, first-served basis, and there is no guarantee that all instances in the organization will be charged at the RI rate. In this case, Account A has purchased five RIs and has four instances running, so all four instances will be charged at the RI rate. Account B has not purchased any RIs and also has four instances running, so all four instances will be charged at the regular rate. The remaining RI in Account A will not be applied to any instance in Account B, and will be wasted.

 Amazon EventBridge is the service that the company should use to meet the requirement of invoking the Lambda function once a day at a specific time. Amazon EventBridge is a serverless event bus service that allows you to easily connect your applications with data from AWS services, SaaS applications, and your own applications. You can use Amazon EventBridge to create rules that match events and route them to targets such as AWS Lambda functions, Amazon SNS topics, Amazon SQS queues, or other AWS services. You can also use Amazon EventBridge to create scheduled rules that trigger your targets at a specific time or interval, such as once a day. AWS Managed Services (AMS), AWS CodeStar, and AWS Step Functions are not services that the company should use to meet this requirement. AMS is a service that provides operational management for your AWS infrastructure and applications. AWS CodeStar is a service that provides a unified user interface for managing software development projects on AWS. AWS Step Functions is a service that coordinates multiple AWS services into serverless workflows.

 The perspective of the AWS Cloud Adoption Framework (AWS CAF) that connects technology and business is governance. The governance perspective focuses on the alignment of the IT strategy and processes with the business strategy and goals, as well as the management of the IT budget, risk, and compliance. The governance perspective capabilities are portfolio management, business performance management, and IT governance. The governance perspective helps organizations ensure that their cloud adoption delivers the expected business value and outcomes, and that their cloud solutions are secure, reliable, and compliant. Operations, people, and security are other perspectives of the AWS CAF, but they do not directly connect technology and business. The operations perspective focuses on the management and monitoring of the cloud resources and applications, as well as the automation and optimization of the operational processes. The people perspective focuses on the development and empowerment of the human resources, as well as the transformation of the organizational culture and structure. The security perspective focuses on the protection of the information assets and systems in the cloud, as well as the implementation of the security policies and controls.

Amazon Rekognition is the AWS service that the company should use to build the capability of identifying and removing inappropriate photos. Amazon Rekognition is a service that uses deep learning technology to analyze images and videos for various purposes, such as face detection, object recognition, text extraction, and content moderation. Amazon Rekognition can help users detect unsafe or inappropriate content in images and videos, such as nudity, violence, or drugs, and provide confidence scores for each label. Amazon Rekognition does not require any machine learning expertise, and users can easily integrate it with other AWS services

 AWS Organizations is a service that enables you to consolidate multiple AWS accounts into an organization that you create and centrally manage. With AWS Organizations, you can apply service control policies (SCPs) across multiple AWS accounts to restrict what services and actions users and roles can access. You can also use AWS Organizations to enable features such as consolidated billing, AWS Config rules and conformance packs, and AWS CloudFormation StackSets across multiple accounts3. One of the benefits of using AWS Organizations is that you can share your Reserved Instances (RIs) with all of the accounts in your organization. This enables you to take advantage of the billing benefits of RIs without having to specify which account will use them4. AWS Systems Manager is a service that gives you visibility and control of your infrastructure on AWS. Cost Explorer is a tool that enables you to visualize, understand, and manage your AWS costs and usage over time. AWS Trusted Advisor is a service that provides real-time guidance to help you provision your resources following AWS best practices. None of these services or tools can help you manage the AWS accounts for all the departments so that the departments can share the Reserved Instances.

Hardware and infrastructure is the option that AWS is responsible for under the AWS shared responsibility model. The AWS shared responsibility model describes how AWS and customers share responsibilities for security and compliance in the cloud. AWS is responsible for security of the cloud, which means protecting the infrastructure that runs all the services offered in the AWS Cloud. This infrastructure is composed of the hardware, software, networking, and facilities that run AWS Cloud services. Customers are responsible for security in the cloud, which means taking care of the security of their own applications, data, and operating systems. This includes network and firewall configuration, client-side data encryption, management of user permissions, and more.

Amazon Aurora (with PostgreSQL compatibility) and Amazon EC2 can both host PostgreSQL databases. Aurora is a managed database service that provides a fully compatible PostgreSQL environment with automated management. EC2 can also host PostgreSQL, but it requires more manual setup and maintenance. Amazon S3 and EFS do not host databases, and Amazon OpenSearch Service is intended for search and analytics, not relational databases.

AWS Outposts extend AWS infrastructure and services to on-premises locations, providing low-latency access to AWS resources and ensuring data residency. This service is suitable for hybrid environments that require the same AWS services and infrastructure to be available locally. Wavelength, Transit Gateway, and Ground Station do not specifically address low-latency access to on-premises resources or data residency.

AWS Direct Connect provides a dedicated private network connection from on-premises data centers directly to the AWS Cloud, bypassing the public internet. This setup is ideal for reducing network costs, increasing bandwidth throughput, and providing a more consistent network experience compared to standard internet connections. Other services, such as Amazon VPC, relate to networking but do not establish a private network connection from on-premises to AWS.

Amazon RDS provides a managed database service that supports MariaDB with minimal operational overhead. It handles routine database tasks such as backups, patching, and scaling, reducing the burden on users. Amazon Neptune and DynamoDB are not compatible with MariaDB, and Amazon S3 is not a relational database service.

The AWS Cloud's global infrastructure enables rapid deployment across multiple geographic regions, allowing companies to extend applications to new markets quickly. This capability to "go global in minutes" is especially valuable for businesses looking to reach customers in new countries without building data centers. Other options, like speed and agility, are advantages but do not specifically address global deployment.

One of the main advantages of cloud computing is the ability to trade fixed capital expenditures for variable operating expenses. By moving to the AWS Cloud, the company pays only for the resources it uses on a per-usage basis, reducing the need for large upfront investments in data center infrastructure. This benefit allows for more flexible and cost-effective spending based on actual usage. Other options, such as increased speed and agility or global reach, are also cloud benefits but do not specifically address the shift from fixed to variable expenses.

AWS Config enables users to assess, audit, and evaluate the configurations of AWS resources. It provides information that can be used by external auditors to ensure compliance with various regulatory requirements by tracking changes and maintaining configuration history. Amazon Cognito, FSx, and Inspector do not provide detailed configuration tracking for audit purposes.

Amazon Rekognition provides machine learning capabilities to analyze images and videos, enabling the detection of objects, people, text, and scenes. It is designed specifically for image and video analysis, making it suitable for various use cases like facial recognition and content moderation. Other services like Amazon Connect, Lightsail, and Personalize do not offer image or video analysis capabilities.

In the AWS Cloud Adoption Framework (AWS CAF), theGovernanceperspective focuses on aligning IT strategy and goals with business processes, which includes managing data assets, setting up an inventory of data products, and ensuring that data cataloging and metadata management are in place. This perspective is crucial for organizing data products and services, which aligns with building a comprehensive data catalog. Other perspectives like Operations, Business, and Platform do not specifically address the management of a data catalog.

AWS Trusted Advisor provides checks and recommendations across various categories, including cost optimization, security, and performance. Access to all Trusted Advisor checks is available with AWS Business Support, ensuring the company can follow AWS best practices comprehensively. The Developer Support plan offers limited Trusted Advisor checks, and AWS Health Dashboard provides insights into service health but not specific best practice recommendations.

Under the AWS Shared Responsibility Model, AWS manages the securityofthe cloud, while customers manage securityinthe cloud. For EC2 instances, it is the customer’s responsibility to manage the guestoperating system, including patching and encrypting data stored on attached storage volumes. AWS is responsible for the underlying infrastructure, including physical security and hypervisor maintenance.

AWS DataSync is designed for large-scale data transfers, especially involving large datasets with millions of files from on-premises to AWS. It provides fast and efficient transfer capabilities, and supports a one-time migration. AWS DMS is specific to databases, while Migration Hub is for tracking migrations, and Application Migration Service is for continuous replication rather than one-time file migrations.

SSH keys provide secure login for Linux-based Amazon EC2 instances by establishing a secure connection over SSH (Secure Shell), protecting login credentials from interception. VPNs and encryption enhance security in other contexts, but SSH keys are the standard approach for accessing Linux EC2 instances. Amazon Route 53 is unrelated to EC2 instance access.

The reliability pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework emphasizes building systems that can recover from failures and dynamically adjust to meet demand. This includes designing to automatically recover from failures and implementing mechanisms to manage capacity demands, avoiding manual guesswork. The other options do not align with core reliability principles, as operating in a single Availability Zone or preemptively adjusting quotas in a secondary region does not inherently improve reliability.

Enforcing multi-factor authentication (MFA) for privileged users enhances account security by requiring a second form of authentication. It reduces the risk of unauthorized access, even if credentials are compromised. Removing the root account is not possible, and creating access keys for the root account or privileged users can increase security risks rather than reduce them.

Amazon S3 offers virtually unlimited storage, allowing customers to store and retrieve any amount of data. There are no practical limits to the total volume of data that can be stored in S3, making it suitable for applications that require vast amounts of storage. The options of 10 PB, 50 PB, and 100 PB are incorrect as they do not reflect the actual scale of S3.

AWS Organizations enables consolidated billing across multiple AWS accounts and allows for centralized management of security and compliance policies. It provides account grouping and centralized payment management, making it the optimal choice for a company requiring consolidated billing and centralized governance. AWS Cost and Usage Report only provides billing information, and AWS Config and Security Hub offer monitoring and security insights but do not handle billing consolidation.

AWS Snowball Edge is designed for large-scale data transfer tasks, allowing companies to transport significant amounts of data (up to petabytes) from their data centers to AWS without relying on the internet. With the ability to transfer 100 TB of data securely and efficiently, Snowball Edge is the ideal choice for this use case. AWS Snowcone is for smaller transfers, and AWS Data Exchange and DataSync are not designed for physical data transport.

On-Demand Instances are most cost-effective for short-term, steady, and unpredictable workloads. Using them for a one-month testing period allows flexibility without a long-term commitment. For long-term workloads (like a year or more), Reserved Instances or Savings Plans would be more cost-effective. Spot Instances are better for interruptible, flexible workloads.

AWS SDKs Overview:

AWS Software Development Kits (SDKs) provide libraries and tools for developers to interact with AWS services programmatically.

SDKs are available for multiple programming languages, including Python, Java, JavaScript, and .NET.

How AWS SDKs Meet the Requirement:

Enable developers to integrate AWS services into their applications easily.

Include API clients, authentication helpers, and other utilities specific to AWS services.

Why Other Options Are Incorrect:

A. AWS CodePipeline:Automates CI/CD pipelines but does not provide libraries for development.

C. Amazon CloudWatch:Focuses on monitoring and logging; not a development toolset.

D. AWS CodeDeploy:Automates application deployment but does not include development libraries.

AWS Transit Gateway acts as a cloud router for connecting multiple VPCs and on-premises networks, simplifying network management by creating a hub-and-spoke model for routing traffic. Direct Connect provides a private connection to AWS but does not function as a central router. Amazon Connect is unrelated, and Route 53 is for DNS services, not VPC connectivity.

Amazon EventBridge (formerly CloudWatch Events) allows users to respond to changes in the state of AWS resources. It can be configured to invoke an AWS Lambda function when an EC2 instance enters the “stopping” state, providing a serverless way to automate responses to changes in EC2 instance states. AWS Config, SNS, and CloudFormation do not provide direct triggering for specific instance state changes.

Network ACLs (NACLs) are subnet-level firewalls in AWS, controlling inbound and outbound traffic for VPC subnets. They provide an additional layer of security by allowing or denying traffic based on IP protocol, source and destination IP, and port. Security groups operate at the instance level, while Traffic Mirroring and Internet Gateways do not function as firewalls at the subnet level.

Amazon Rekognition is a machine learning service that can analyze and recognize objects, people, text, scenes, and activities in images and videos. It is specifically designed for organizing, categorizing, and searching large volumes of images based on various attributes. Amazon Transcribe is for speech-to-text, Amazon Aurora is a relational database service, and Amazon QuickSight is a business intelligence tool for data visualization.

AWS Elastic Beanstalk is a managed service that facilitates the deployment and management of applications in the AWS Cloud. It supports multiple programming languages and frameworks, allowing users to deploy web applications without managing the underlying infrastructure. Elastic Beanstalk automatically handles deployment, capacity provisioning, load balancing, and auto-scaling. The other services listed, like CodeGuru, Fargate, and CodeCommit, do not provide full application deployment and management capabilities.

AWS CloudHSM provides hardware-based key management to manage and protect encryption keys in the AWS Cloud. It allows customers to generate and use their own encryption keys while complying withrigorous security requirements. WhileAWS Certificate Manager (ACM)manages SSL/TLS certificates, it does not handle encryption keys independently, andAWS License ManagerandAWS Directory Serviceare not designed for managing encryption keys. AWS KMS is also relevant for key management but wasn't listed as an option in this question.

AWS Application Discovery Service helps companies gather information about on-premises data centers to support migration planning. It collects data on system configuration, resource utilization, and network dependencies, providing essential insights for migration. AWS DataSync and Storage Gateway are used for data transfer, while AWS DMS is for database migration specifically.

AWS Direct Connect provides a dedicated, low-latency, and consistent network connection between on-premises data centers and AWS. This private connection minimizes latency and improves network stability compared to a public internet connection or VPN. AWS Direct Connect is ideal for applications requiring real-time data transfer with minimal latency.

AWS Artifact provides on-demand access to AWS compliance reports and security documentation. It is a self-service portal where customers can download documents like SOC reports, ISO certifications, and other compliance-related materials necessary for meeting regulatory requirements. AWS Config and Trusted Advisor offer security assessments and compliance monitoring, but they do not provide direct access to compliance reports.

To follow the principle of least privilege, the company should create an IAM user with only programmatic access since the access is limited to AWS CLI and SDKs, not the Management Console. Additionally, a custom IAM policy granting specific Amazon RDS permissions should be created and attached to this user to restrict access solely to necessary actions. Providing programmatic access only ensures adherence to security best practices by limiting access to the required interfaces.

Savings Plans offer cost savings for predictable, steady workloads over a one or three-year term, with flexibility in instance family and size, making them suitable for critical workloads on EC2 instances that will run for a long term like three years. Spot Instances are more cost-effective but not suitable forcritical, predictable workloads due to potential interruptions. Dedicated Hosts and On-Demand Instances would be more costly.

Amazon Athena Overview:

Amazon Athena is a serverless query service that allows users to analyze data in S3 using standard SQL.

It is commonly used to query AWS Cost and Usage Reports stored in S3.

How It Works for Cost Reports:

Cost and Usage Reports are delivered in a structured format to an S3 bucket.

Athena can query these reports without requiring additional ETL processes.

Why Other Options Are Incorrect:

A. Amazon OpenSearch Service:Designed for search and log analytics, not querying structured data.

C. Amazon Aurora:A relational database service, unsuitable for querying S3 data directly.

D. AWS Glue:Used for ETL tasks but not directly for querying.

AWS Transit Gateway serves as a central hub that enables connectivity between multiple VPCs and on-premises networks. It simplifies network architecture and management by acting as a centralized gateway for traffic flowing between all connected networks. Other options, such as Gateway VPC Endpoints and AWS PrivateLink, do not provide the centralized, scalable connectivity that Transit Gateway offers across multiple VPCs and on-premises environments.

The reliability pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework includes the principle of testing recovery procedures to ensure systems can effectively recover from failures. Regular testing of recovery processes helps verify that systems are resilient and can handle potential disruptions. The other options align with different pillars like cost optimization and operational excellence.

A VPC endpoint enables private connections between an Amazon VPC and AWS services, like Amazon S3, without requiring internet access. This allows secure access to S3 from an EC2 instance within the same VPC, reducing latency and improving security. VPN connections and NAT gateways do not eliminate internet traffic, and an internet gateway would expose the VPC to the public internet.

AWS Systems Manager offers the capability to automate patching for Amazon EC2 instances, including Windows instances, through Patch Manager. It can automate patching tasks, schedule updates, and apply patches based on specified baselines. AWS Organizations and Control Tower focus on account management and governance, while Elastic Load Balancing (ELB) is unrelated to patch management.