Google Professional Cloud Security Engineer Exam Dumps and Practice Test Questions Set10 Q181-200

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Question 181.

A company wants to prevent any Google Cloud project from creating Compute Engine instances with external IP addresses in production environments. Which approach enforces this requirement organization-wide?

A) IAM role restrictions on Compute Engine
B) VPC Service Controls perimeter
C) Organization Policy constraint compute.restrictExternalIp
D) Cloud Logging alerts with Cloud Functions

Answer: C

Explanation:

A) IAM role restrictions on Compute Engine manage which users can create, modify, or delete VM instances, but they cannot enforce specific configuration constraints such as restricting external IPs. While IAM ensures that only authorized identities perform actions, it does not prevent misconfigurations that could expose workloads to the public internet.

B) VPC Service Controls establish a perimeter around Google Cloud resources to prevent data exfiltration via APIs and services. While VPC-SC limits access to authorized networks, it does not enforce instance-level configuration, such as disallowing external IP addresses on VMs.

C) Organization Policy constraints, specifically restrictExternalIp, provide proactive enforcement at the organization or folder level, automatically denying attempts to create VM instances with external IPs in restricted projects. This preventive control ensures that all workloads remain internal to private networks, reducing exposure to the public internet and minimizing attack surfaces. By enforcing this policy, organizations maintain consistent security posture across multiple projects without relying on reactive measures. Combined with private Google access, firewall rules, and Zero Trust principles, it significantly strengthens network security.

D) Cloud Logging alerts, often paired with Cloud Functions, provide visibility into attempted violations of security policies. While they cannot prevent the creation of non-compliant VMs, these logs help security teams monitor attempts to circumvent restrictions and respond accordingly. Integration with Cloud Asset Inventory and Security Command Center enhances auditing and compliance monitoring.

By combining organization policy constraints with IAM, VPC-SC, and Cloud Logging monitoring, organizations enforce preventive security, reduce operational risk, and maintain compliance with regulatory frameworks while ensuring that production workloads remain isolated from public exposure. This approach provides both real-time enforcement and actionable visibility, critical for secure and compliant cloud operations.

Question 182.

A financial institution needs to enforce that all Cloud KMS keys used in production are automatically rotated every 90 days and cannot be disabled by users. Which approach meets this requirement?

A) Manual key rotation by administrators
B) Cloud KMS key version rotation with Organization Policy
C) Default Google-managed keys
D) IAM conditional roles on key access

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) Manual key rotation by administrators involves human intervention to update cryptographic keys. While it allows direct control, it is error-prone, inconsistent, and difficult to scale across multiple projects. Human error or missed rotation schedules can leave keys vulnerable to compromise, increasing organizational risk.

B) Cloud KMS key version rotation, combined with Organization Policy, provides automated, enforceable key rotation. Administrators can set rotation intervals and prevent disabling of rotation, ensuring that all cryptographic keys are regularly updated without manual intervention. This centralized approach guarantees that compliance policies are uniformly applied across all projects, minimizing operational overhead and eliminating gaps due to human error.

C) Default Google-managed keys offer convenience but do not provide customers with control over key rotation schedules or lifecycle management. While they ensure data is encrypted, organizations cannot enforce regulatory requirements or customize rotation intervals, limiting their suitability for environments requiring strict compliance like PCI-DSS, GLBA, or SOC 2.

D) IAM conditional roles can control which users or service accounts can access cryptographic keys and under what conditions. However, IAM conditions do not enforce rotation schedules or ensure keys are periodically refresheD)

By leveraging automated rotation in Cloud KMS with Organization Policy enforcement, organizations reduce the risk associated with long-lived keys, ensure regulatory compliance, and maintain a Zero Trust cryptography model. Combined with Cloud KMS audit logs, administrators gain full visibility into key usage and administrative actions, enabling traceability and accountability. This approach ensures that sensitive encryption keys are consistently updated, mitigates potential security vulnerabilities, and provides a reliable foundation for protecting critical data across cloud environments.

Question 183.

A company wants to enforce multi-factor authentication (MFA) for all users accessing GCP resources and ensure that external identities cannot bypass this requirement. Which solution is most appropriate?

A) IAM roles with conditional access based on IP
B) BeyondCorp Enterprise with MFA enforcement
C) Cloud Armor
D) Cloud Logging alerts

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) IAM roles with conditional access based on IP can restrict access to resources from specific networks or locations. While this provides some level of contextual access control, it does not enforce multi-factor authentication (MFA) or evaluate device security posture. This leaves a gap in security where users may meet IP conditions but still access resources with compromised credentials or insecure devices.

B) BeyondCorp Enterprise provides a comprehensive Zero Trust access model by enforcing MFA and evaluating device posture before granting access. It integrates with identity providers to verify user identity and ensures devices comply with security policies, such as patch levels, encryption, and endpoint protection. By enforcing MFA, BeyondCorp ensures that access is granted only to verified users using secure devices, reducing the risk of credential compromise and unauthorized access. This proactive approach strengthens the security posture for sensitive cloud resources.

C) Cloud Armor protects HTTP/S applications from network-based threats like DDoS attacks or malicious traffiC) While critical for perimeter security, it does not manage identity verification, MFA, or device compliance. Therefore, Cloud Armor cannot prevent unauthorized users with valid credentials from accessing protected resources.

D) Cloud Logging alerts provide monitoring and visibility into events or suspicious activities. These alerts are reactive and do not prevent access; they only notify administrators after events occur.

Combining BeyondCorp Enterprise with conditional IAM policies enhances security by enforcing proactive identity verification and device compliance, while Cloud Armor and logging complement this by protecting the application layer and providing auditability. This integrated approach aligns with regulatory requirements, reduces operational risk, and ensures modern, context-aware security practices for cloud environments. It effectively mitigates threats associated with compromised credentials, unsecured devices, or unauthorized access attempts.

Question 184.

A company wants to ensure that all service accounts used by workloads in production do not have excessive privileges and follow the principle of least privilege. Which approach is most effective?

A) Use IAM Recommender and enforce Organization Policy
B) Assign Owner roles to all service accounts
C) Audit service account usage quarterly
D) Enable Cloud Logging alerts

Answer: A

Explanation:

A) IAM Recommender provides actionable insights into service account permissions by analyzing actual usage patterns and suggesting least-privilege roles. By enforcing Organization Policy constraints alongside these recommendations, organizations can ensure that service accounts are granted only the permissions they truly require. This proactive approach prevents privilege creep and enforces consistent security standards across all projects, reducing the likelihood of unauthorized access or accidental misconfigurations. Applying Org Policy constraints ensures that these least-privilege recommendations are automatically enforced at scale, providing a uniform security posture for all resources.

B) Assigning Owner roles to all service accounts significantly increases security risk. Owner roles grant unrestricted access, including the ability to delete or modify resources across the project. This violates the principle of least privilege and exposes the organization to accidental changes, malicious activity, and potential regulatory non-compliance.

C) Conducting quarterly audits of service account usage is a reactive measure. While audits help identify overprivileged accounts after the fact, they do not prevent misconfigurations or privilege escalation from occurring in real-time. Audits also require manual effort and may not scale effectively in organizations with large numbers of service accounts.

D) Enabling Cloud Logging alerts provides visibility into actions taken by service accounts, supporting monitoring and forensic investigations. However, alerts alone cannot enforce proper access controls or prevent overprivileged accounts from performing sensitive actions.

Combining IAM Recommender with Organization Policy allows organizations to proactively enforce least privilege across all service accounts, minimizing security risks while ensuring compliance with frameworks such as SOC 2, ISO 27001, and HIPAA) This approach ensures that production workloads operate securely with only the permissions required, reduces the attack surface, and supports continuous risk mitigation and governance.

Question 185.

A company wants to ensure that all sensitive BigQuery datasets are encrypted with keys that the organization fully controls, and that Google personnel cannot access plaintext key material. Which approach is most suitable?

A) Default Google-managed encryption
B) Cloud KMS software-managed keys
C) Cloud HSM-backed CMEK
D) Customer-supplied encryption keys (CSEK)

Answer: C

Explanation:

A) Default Google-managed encryption provides encryption at rest automatically for all Google Cloud resources. While this ensures data is encrypted, customers do not have direct control over key management, rotation, or access. Google manages key lifecycle internally, which is sufficient for many standard workloads but does not meet the strictest regulatory or compliance requirements where customer control over keys is requireD)

B) Cloud KMS software-managed keys offer more control than default encryption, allowing organizations to manage key rotation, auditing, and usage policies. However, these keys are stored in software and do not leverage hardware-backed security modules, making them less resistant to certain types of attacks and insider threats compared to HSM-backed keys.

C) Cloud HSM-backed CMEK combines the benefits of customer-managed encryption with hardware-backed key protection. Keys are stored in FIPS 140-2 Level 3 certified HSMs, ensuring that Google personnel cannot access plaintext keys. This provides strong isolation and security guarantees for highly regulated workloads. Organizations can enforce strict key rotation schedules, manage the full key lifecycle, and generate audit logs for compliance frameworks such as PCI-DSS, HIPAA, GLBA, and SOC 2. Integration with GCP services like BigQuery, Cloud Storage, and Cloud SQL allows seamless use of HSM-backed keys across the environment while maintaining regulatory compliance.

D) Customer-supplied encryption keys (CSEK) give organizations full control over key material, including generation, rotation, and distribution. While this offers maximum control, it introduces operational complexity, increases the risk of mismanagement, and requires rigorous processes to prevent accidental data loss.

Overall, Cloud HSM-backed CMEK strikes a balance between strong cryptographic assurance, compliance readiness, and operational efficiency. It ensures sensitive data is protected with keys under customer control, prevents unauthorized access, and supports regulatory adherence, making it the preferred solution for highly sensitive workloads.

Question 186.

An organization wants to ensure that all network traffic between on-premises systems and GCP is encrypted, authenticated, and restricted to known devices without using traditional VPNs. Which approach should be implemented?

A) IPsec VPN
B) Cloud NAT
C) BeyondCorp Enterprise with device-based access
D) IAM conditional roles

Answer: C

Explanation:

A) IPsec VPN provides encrypted tunnels for network traffic between on-premises environments and GCP. While it ensures data in transit is protected, it relies on shared secrets or certificates for authentication and does not enforce identity verification or device compliance. VPNs operate on the network layer, granting access to all traffic once connected, which can increase the risk of lateral movement if credentials or endpoints are compromiseD)

B) Cloud NAT enables outbound internet access for private resources without exposing them to public IPs. While useful for routing and connectivity, it does not provide authentication, authorization, or device verification. Cloud NAT does not prevent unauthorized access, nor does it enforce Zero Trust principles, as it focuses solely on network address translation.

C) BeyondCorp Enterprise implements Zero Trust by requiring both user identity verification and device posture checks before granting access to resources. Device-based authentication ensures that only compliant, approved devices can connect to workloads, preventing compromised or unmanaged devices from accessing sensitive datA) BeyondCorp integrates with identity providers and endpoint management solutions to enforce MFA, OS patch levels, and security policies, making it a proactive security solution that mitigates insider threats and reduces reliance on traditional perimeter security.

D) IAM conditional roles allow policy enforcement based on identity, IP address, or other contextual factors. While they provide fine-grained access control, they do not inherently verify device compliance or ensure Zero Trust networking. Conditional roles are effective for permission management but must be combined with a device-aware solution like BeyondCorp to enforce security across all endpoints.

By combining BeyondCorp with strong identity and device posture enforcement, organizations move beyond traditional network-based access controls. This approach ensures secure access, reduces the attack surface, aligns with modern security frameworks, and protects sensitive workloads from unauthorized or risky connections, providing comprehensive Zero Trust protection.

Question 187.

A company wants to restrict access to production Cloud Storage buckets so that only users on managed devices and from specific corporate networks can access sensitive objects. Which combination provides the strongest enforcement?

A) IAM roles with default permissions
B) Access Context Manager with VPC Service Controls
C) Cloud Logging alerts
D) Cloud Armor policies

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) IAM roles with default permissions provide baseline access control by granting predefined privileges to users or service accounts. While essential for role-based access, default IAM roles cannot enforce context-aware conditions such as device compliance, network location, or risk-based access. Relying solely on IAM roles increases the risk of over-privileged accounts and potential data exfiltration, as permissions are static and do not adapt to contextual factors.

B) Access Context Manager (ACM) combined with VPC Service Controls provides a robust security framework for enforcing Zero Trust principles. ACM allows administrators to define access policies based on identity, device posture, and network location, ensuring that only authorized and compliant devices can reach critical resources. VPC Service Controls create service perimeters around sensitive services such as Cloud Storage, BigQuery, and Pub/Sub, preventing data from being transferred outside the authorized network boundaries. Together, these tools prevent unauthorized access, reduce the attack surface, and enforce least-privilege access consistently across the organization.

C) Cloud Logging alerts provide visibility into access attempts and policy violations, enabling security teams to monitor and investigate anomalous activities. However, alerts alone are reactive—they do not actively prevent unauthorized access or enforce access policies. Integration with automated workflows can improve response times but cannot replace proactive enforcement mechanisms like ACM and VPC Service Controls.

D) Cloud Armor policies protect HTTP/S applications from threats such as DDoS attacks and IP-based attacks. While effective for web application security, Cloud Armor does not provide context-aware access control for storage APIs or other sensitive services.

By leveraging ACM and VPC Service Controls together, organizations implement a proactive, context-aware access model that enforces both identity and network conditions. This ensures that only compliant users and devices can access production Cloud Storage buckets, prevents data exfiltration, reduces insider threat risks, and supports regulatory compliance with frameworks like SOC 2, HIPAA, and ISO 27001. This strategy aligns with modern Zero Trust security architectures and strengthens the overall organizational security posture.

Question 188.

A company wants to ensure that all container images deployed in production GKE clusters are from trusted sources and verified before deployment. Which solution enforces this requirement?

A) Binary Authorization with Organization Policy
B) Cloud Logging monitoring
C) IAM roles only
D) Cloud Armor WAF policies

Answer: A

Explanation:

A) Binary Authorization with Organization Policy provides a proactive and automated mechanism to enforce secure container deployment. It ensures that only container images that meet organizational security standards—validated through signed attestations—can be deployed to Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) clusters. By integrating Binary Authorization at the organizational level, administrators can centrally enforce deployment policies across all projects, ensuring consistency and reducing the risk of running unverified or potentially malicious images in production. This approach minimizes operational risk, enhances supply chain security, and strengthens the overall security posture.

B) Cloud Logging monitoring offers visibility into deployment events, policy violations, and system activities. While it is valuable for auditing and tracking compliance, it is primarily reactive. Logging alone does not prevent insecure container images from being deployed; it only records the event after it occurs. Therefore, relying solely on monitoring would not provide the preventative control needed to maintain secure production environments.

C) IAM roles alone control permissions for users and service accounts but cannot validate the security or provenance of container images. Granting roles without integrating Binary Authorization leaves GKE clusters vulnerable to accidental or malicious deployment of unverified images, which can compromise workloads and data integrity.

D) Cloud Armor WAF policies protect applications from network-level threats such as DDoS attacks, SQL injection, and cross-site scripting. While critical for perimeter security, Cloud Armor does not manage container image verification or prevent unauthorized images from deploying in Kubernetes environments.

By combining Binary Authorization with Organization Policy, organizations achieve automated enforcement of container security policies. This ensures that only trusted and validated images are deployed, aligns with CI/CD best practices, reduces operational and compliance risks, and supports regulatory frameworks such as SOC 2, HIPAA, and ISO 27001. When used alongside Cloud Logging, teams gain both proactive prevention and reactive visibility, creating a comprehensive security strategy for containerized workloads.

Question 189.

An enterprise wants to ensure that service account keys cannot be created in production, while still allowing workloads to authenticate using Workload Identity Federation. What solution should be implemented?

A) IAM deny policies
B) Organization Policy iam.disableServiceAccountKeyCreation
C) Cloud Logging alerts
D) Cloud Functions monitoring

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) IAM deny policies provide a way to restrict specific actions for identities, such as preventing the use of certain roles or permissions. However, they cannot consistently enforce organization-wide restrictions on service account key creation across multiple projects. While useful for controlling access, deny policies do not provide a centralized mechanism to prevent developers or administrators from generating long-lived keys that could pose a security risk.

B) The Organization Policy constraint iam.disableServiceAccountKeyCreation enforces a preventive control across all projects, ensuring that no long-lived service account keys can be createD) This helps eliminate the risk of key leakage or misuse, which is a common source of credential compromise. With this constraint, workloads can still authenticate securely using alternative mechanisms such as Workload Identity Federation or the metadata server credentials, maintaining operational flexibility without sacrificing security. By implementing this policy, organizations enforce Zero Trust principles, reducing reliance on static credentials and ensuring that access is tied to secure, auditable identity methods.

C) Cloud Logging alerts provide visibility into administrative actions and potential violations of security policies. While valuable for monitoring and auditing, logging alone is reactive and cannot prevent the creation of service account keys. Alerts generated after the fact may help with incident investigation but do not eliminate the risk of key misuse or accidental exposure.

D) Cloud Functions monitoring can automate responses to certain events, such as key creation, by triggering remediation workflows. However, this approach also relies on post-event detection and remediation rather than preventing the risk from occurring in the first place.

By combining the preventive power of the Organization Policy constraint with monitoring and audit capabilities, organizations achieve a robust security posture. Developers and administrators are prevented from creating long-lived keys, reducing attack surfaces, while audit logs provide traceability for compliance frameworks such as SOC 2, HIPAA, and ISO 27001. This approach ensures that credentials are managed securely, rotations are automated, and production environments remain protected against unauthorized access or key compromise.

Question 190.

A company wants to ensure that all BigQuery queries against sensitive datasets are executed only by users on devices meeting compliance requirements and from approved networks. Which solution should be implemented?

A) IAM conditional roles alone
B) VPC Service Controls perimeter combined with Access Context Manager
C) BigQuery row-level security
D) Cloud Logging monitoring

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) IAM conditional roles alone allow administrators to apply fine-grained access controls based on attributes such as resource, time, or user identity. While they are effective for enforcing least privilege access at the identity level, they cannot evaluate the context of the request beyond the identity attributes. This means IAM conditions cannot determine whether a request is coming from a trusted network or whether the device complies with security policies, leaving a gap in enforcing Zero Trust principles.

B) Combining VPC Service Controls with Access Context Manager provides a robust framework to protect sensitive datasets in BigQuery. VPC Service Controls create security perimeters around resources, preventing data exfiltration from unauthorized networks. Access Context Manager complements this by evaluating device posture, location, and other contextual attributes before granting access. This combination ensures that even if credentials are compromised, access is only permitted from approved devices and networks, greatly reducing the risk of unauthorized access. It also helps organizations comply with regulatory requirements such as GDPR, HIPAA, and SOC 2 by enforcing strict network and device-level access policies.

C) BigQuery row-level security restricts the data that users can query based on conditions defined per row. While this is important for controlling sensitive information exposure within queries, it does not prevent access from non-compliant networks or devices. Therefore, row-level security alone cannot enforce the contextual restrictions required for a Zero Trust model.

D) Cloud Logging monitoring captures all access events and can alert administrators to unusual activity or attempted policy violations. However, logging is reactive; it does not prevent unauthorized access in real-time. It is useful for auditing, investigation, and compliance purposes but must be combined with proactive controls like VPC Service Controls and Access Context Manager to effectively protect sensitive datasets.

By integrating proactive network and context-based access enforcement with auditing and row-level security, organizations achieve a layered defense model. This ensures that only authorized users on compliant devices and trusted networks can access sensitive BigQuery data, while audit logs provide traceability and support regulatory compliance.

Question 191.

An organization wants to ensure that all Cloud Functions accessing production datasets cannot exfiltrate data outside approved networks. Which approach is best?

A) IAM roles only
B) VPC Service Controls with service perimeter
C) Firewall rules on Cloud Functions
D) Cloud Logging alerts

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) IAM roles alone provide identity-based access control, allowing administrators to grant permissions to users or service accounts. While essential for enforcing least privilege, IAM roles cannot restrict access based on network location, device posture, or the source of a request. This means that even with properly configured IAM roles, a compromised credential could still access sensitive resources from an untrusted network or environment, which does not align with Zero Trust principles.

B) VPC Service Controls with a defined service perimeter provide a proactive mechanism to prevent unauthorized access and data exfiltration. By establishing perimeters around resources such as Cloud Functions, BigQuery, or Cloud Storage, organizations ensure that only requests originating from trusted projects, networks, or services are permitteD) This prevents functions from accessing data outside authorized boundaries and mitigates risks posed by compromised accounts or misconfigured permissions. Service perimeters also integrate with Access Context Manager, allowing additional enforcement based on device posture, user identity, or geographic location. This combination strengthens Zero Trust enforcement and supports compliance with frameworks like HIPAA, SOC 2, and GDPR.

C) Firewall rules cannot be directly applied to serverless Cloud Functions, as they are abstracted from the underlying network. While firewalls are useful for controlling traffic to traditional VM instances, they do not provide protection for serverless workloads. Relying solely on firewall rules for Cloud Functions leaves a security gap that can be mitigated by service perimeters.

D) Cloud Logging alerts provide visibility into access attempts and can notify administrators of unusual or potentially unauthorized activity. However, logging is reactive and cannot block access in real-time. While useful for auditing and compliance reporting, it must be combined with proactive controls like VPC Service Controls to effectively secure serverless environments.

By leveraging VPC Service Controls with Access Context Manager, organizations can enforce a strong perimeter around serverless workloads, ensuring that only authorized requests from trusted contexts succeeD) This approach minimizes the attack surface, reduces the risk of data exfiltration, and aligns with modern security best practices for cloud-native applications.

Question 192.

A company wants to ensure that all service account activity is logged and auditable, including failed attempts to access sensitive production resources. Which solution should be used?

A) Cloud Audit Logging
B) IAM role restrictions only
C) Cloud Armor
D) VPC Service Controls

Answer: A

Explanation:

A) Cloud Audit Logging provides comprehensive visibility into all administrative and data access events within a Google Cloud environment. It captures detailed records of actions taken by users, service accounts, and administrators, including both successful and failed attempts to access resources. This includes key operations on sensitive data, configuration changes, and permission modifications. By maintaining immutable audit logs, organizations can perform forensic analysis, detect unusual activity, and support regulatory compliance requirements such as SOC 2, HIPAA, PCI-DSS, and ISO 27001. Audit logs can also be exported to SIEM systems, enabling real-time monitoring, alerting, and automated incident response workflows, which improves operational security and accountability.

B) IAM role restrictions enforce who can access what resources by granting permissions to users or service accounts. While critical for implementing the principle of least privilege, IAM alone does not provide visibility into actions taken or attempted by those identities. Without logging, unauthorized attempts or misuse could go unnoticed, leaving gaps in security and compliance oversight.

C) Cloud Armor protects web applications from network-based attacks such as DDoS or application-layer exploits. While it strengthens perimeter and application security, it does not capture detailed administrative or data access events, and therefore cannot replace comprehensive auditing mechanisms.

D) VPC Service Controls prevent data exfiltration by defining trusted service perimeters around sensitive resources. They enforce network-level access restrictions but do not provide detailed audit logs of user or service account actions.

By combining Cloud Audit Logging with IAM role enforcement, organizations gain both preventive and detective controls. IAM defines access boundaries, while audit logs capture all activity for compliance, anomaly detection, and accountability. This approach ensures secure management of production workloads, supports proactive incident response, and maintains a robust audit trail for governance and regulatory purposes.

Question 193.

A company wants to prevent developers from deploying unapproved VM images in production. Which solution enforces this automatically?

A) Compute Engine Organization Policy with allowed images constraint
B) IAM deny policies
C) Cloud Logging alerts
D) Manual image approval

Answer: A

Explanation:

A) Compute Engine Organization Policy with allowed images constraints provides a proactive and centralized way to enforce which VM images can be deployed across all projects in an organization. By setting constraints such as constraints/compute.allowedImages or constraints/compute.trustedImageProjects, administrators can ensure that only pre-approved, hardened, and verified images are used for new instances. This reduces the risk of deploying vulnerable or untrusted images, mitigates potential security incidents, and enforces standardization across production workloads. The policy applies automatically to all projects under the organization or folder, ensuring consistent compliance without relying on manual intervention.

B) IAM deny policies are useful for controlling who can perform actions on resources but cannot enforce specific image usage. They prevent certain operations but do not validate the content or provenance of a VM image being deployed, leaving a gap in security enforcement.

C) Cloud Logging alerts can provide visibility into attempted violations of deployment policies, but they are reactive. Alerts notify administrators after an unapproved image has been deployed, which does not prevent the security risk or enforce compliance in real time.

D) Manual image approval processes are labor-intensive and prone to human error. They are inconsistent across multiple projects and do not scale efficiently in large organizations, potentially delaying deployments or allowing mistakes that compromise security.

By combining Compute Engine Organization Policy constraints with automated enforcement, organizations achieve centralized, preventive control over image usage. This approach enhances security, simplifies operational governance, and supports auditability and compliance with regulatory frameworks such as SOC 2, HIPAA, and ISO 27001. Standardizing VM images ensures a hardened, consistent environment that reduces operational risks while maintaining best practices for production workloads.

Question 194.

A security team wants to enforce that all container images deployed to GKE clusters are signed and verifieD) Which combination is most appropriate?

A) Binary Authorization with attestation authorities enforced via Organization Policy
B) Cloud Logging alerts monitoring deployments
C) IAM conditional roles
D) Cloud Armor policies

Answer: A

Explanation:

A) Binary Authorization with attestation authorities enforced via Organization Policy provides a robust, centralized mechanism to ensure that only trusted container images are deployed to production. By requiring signed attestations from approved authorities, organizations can prevent unverified or potentially malicious images from running in GKE clusters or other containerized environments. Enforcing this through Organization Policy guarantees consistency across all projects, eliminating the risk of individual teams bypassing security controls. It integrates seamlessly with CI/CD pipelines, allowing automated verification of images before deployment, which reduces operational overhead while maintaining security standards. This approach supports compliance with regulatory frameworks such as SOC 2, HIPAA, and ISO 27001 and enhances supply chain security by ensuring provenance and integrity of container images.

B) Cloud Logging alerts provide visibility into deployment activities and policy violations but are reactive in nature. While they can inform administrators of noncompliant deployments or attempted policy violations, they do not prevent unverified images from being deployed, leaving potential security gaps.

C) IAM conditional roles are useful for controlling who can perform deployments or manage clusters but do not enforce verification of container image signatures. Without Binary Authorization, conditional roles alone cannot guarantee that only trusted images are deployed, leaving the environment susceptible to supply chain attacks.

D) Cloud Armor policies protect applications from network-level threats and HTTP/S attacks but do not provide control over container image validation or deployment. They cannot enforce image signing or attestations.

Combining Binary Authorization with Organization Policy ensures proactive enforcement of container security, prevents the introduction of unverified or vulnerable images, and provides auditability for compliance purposes. This strategy strengthens operational security, maintains a trusted production environment, and aligns with best practices for secure, regulated cloud deployments.

Question 195.

A company wants to ensure that all production projects are protected from accidental deletion of critical resources. Which approach provides the strongest preventive control?

A) IAM role restrictions only
B) Organization Policy constraints to prevent resource deletion
C) Cloud Logging monitoring
D) Cloud Functions notifications

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) IAM role restrictions allow administrators to control which users can perform actions on resources, including deletion. While these permissions are necessary, they are scoped per project or resource and cannot centrally enforce restrictions across an organization. Relying solely on IAM roles leaves the environment vulnerable to inconsistent enforcement, human error, or privilege escalation that could lead to accidental or malicious deletion of critical resources.

B) Organization Policy constraints provide a proactive, organization-wide mechanism to prevent deletion of critical resources. By applying constraints such as constraints/resourcemanager.disableDelete, administrators can enforce that specific projects, folders, or resources cannot be deleted regardless of individual IAM permissions. This ensures consistent application of corporate governance and regulatory compliance requirements across all projects, reducing operational risk and minimizing the likelihood of accidental or intentional loss of essential systems. Centralized enforcement also simplifies auditability, as all attempts to bypass constraints are automatically denieD)

C) Cloud Logging enables monitoring of resource activities, including attempted deletions. While useful for observability and auditing, logs alone are reactive and cannot prevent deletions from occurring. Administrators can configure alerts, but the resource might already be impacted before any response is initiateD)

D) Cloud Functions can be configured to trigger notifications or automated responses based on events captured in Cloud Logging. However, similar to logging, this is a reactive approach and cannot stop a deletion in progress. Notifications may reduce recovery time but do not inherently prevent resource loss.

By combining Organization Policy constraints with IAM roles, organizations achieve both preventative and controlled access measures. The constraints ensure proactive protection against accidental or malicious deletions, IAM roles enforce appropriate permissions, and logging with automated notifications adds visibility and operational oversight. This approach maintains a secure, compliant, and resilient production environment, protecting critical assets while supporting governance at scale.

Question 196.

A company wants to ensure that all storage buckets containing PII are only accessible from managed devices and approved IP ranges. Which approach is recommended?
A) IAM roles only
B) Access Context Manager with VPC Service Controls
C) Cloud Logging alerts
D) Cloud Armor policies

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) IAM roles are fundamental for controlling permissions within Google Cloud, defining what actions a user or service account can perform on a resource. While critical for access management, IAM roles alone cannot enforce contextual factors such as the device’s security posture, location, or network origin. This limitation means that even if a user has the correct role, they could access sensitive resources from non-compliant devices or insecure networks, increasing the risk of data exposure or exfiltration.

B) Access Context Manager (ACM) combined with VPC Service Controls provides a proactive, context-aware enforcement mechanism. ACM evaluates device posture, such as certificate presence, management status, and OS compliance, before granting access. VPC Service Controls restrict access to sensitive services, like Cloud Storage and BigQuery, ensuring that API calls originate only from approved networks. This combination allows organizations to implement a strong Zero Trust security model, where access is granted based not only on identity but also on device and network context. Sensitive data, particularly personally identifiable information (PII), is protected against unauthorized or risky access attempts, minimizing the potential for data breaches.

C) Cloud Logging alerts provide visibility into attempted or successful access events, including policy violations. While valuable for monitoring and auditing, logging alone is reactive; it does not prevent non-compliant devices or network traffic from reaching sensitive resources.

D) Cloud Armor policies secure HTTP/S applications from network attacks, such as DDoS or malicious requests. However, Cloud Armor does not enforce access conditions at the API or storage level and therefore cannot replace ACM or VPC Service Controls for protecting sensitive datasets.

By combining ACM and VPC Service Controls, organizations gain proactive, fine-grained control over who can access resources and under what conditions. IAM roles provide foundational permission management, logging ensures accountability and auditing, and Cloud Armor protects applications from external threats. Together, these controls maintain strict compliance with regulations such as GDPR and HIPAA, enforce Zero Trust principles, and reduce the risk of unauthorized access or data exfiltration across multiple projects.

Question 197.

An organization wants to automatically remediate any violations of security baseline policies, such as unauthorized firewall changes. Which solution is most effective?

A) Cloud Logging alerts integrated with Cloud Functions
B) IAM role restrictions only
C) VPC Service Controls
D) Cloud Armor WAF

Answer: A

Explanation:

A) Cloud Logging provides detailed records of administrative and operational actions across Google Cloud resources, capturing events such as modifications to firewall rules, IAM policy changes, and service configuration updates. When integrated with Cloud Functions, these logs can trigger automated remediation workflows. For example, if a firewall rule is accidentally modified or deleted, a Cloud Function can automatically restore the previous configuration or notify the security team to take immediate action. This integration ensures that policy violations or misconfigurations are addressed proactively, reducing response time and mitigating potential security risks.

B) IAM role restrictions control which users or service accounts have permissions to modify resources. While critical for enforcing least privilege, IAM restrictions alone cannot automatically respond to accidental or malicious changes. They are reactive in that they only prevent unauthorized actions but do not actively remediate misconfigurations once they occur.

C) VPC Service Controls provide perimeters around sensitive services to prevent unauthorized access or data exfiltration. However, VPC Service Controls do not detect configuration changes or automatically correct misconfigurations. They focus on restricting network access rather than enforcing operational compliance in real time.

D) Cloud Armor protects applications at the HTTP/S layer from threats like DDoS attacks and malicious requests. While essential for perimeter defense, it does not monitor or remediate internal administrative actions or enforce configuration policies for cloud resources.

By combining Cloud Logging alerts with Cloud Functions, organizations create a proactive, automated enforcement mechanism that complements IAM, VPC Service Controls, and Cloud Armor. Logging ensures visibility and accountability, while automated functions allow immediate corrective action. IAM maintains baseline access control, VPC Service Controls enforce network-level restrictions, and Cloud Armor secures the application perimeter. Together, this strategy reduces operational risk, maintains security compliance, and ensures consistent enforcement of security policies across production environments, enabling organizations to respond to incidents rapidly and maintain a strong security posture.

Question 198.

A company wants to enforce that all Cloud SQL instances are encrypted with CMEK and logs are enabled for audit purposes. Which approach meets this requirement at scale?

A) Manual configuration for each instance
B) Organization Policy combined with Cloud KMS
C) IAM deny policies
D) Cloud Logging alerts only

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) Manual configuration of each Cloud SQL instance for encryption is prone to errors, inconsistent application, and does not scale across multiple projects or environments. Relying on administrators to configure CMEK manually increases the likelihood of misconfigurations, leaving sensitive data exposed or noncompliant with regulatory standards. Manual processes are also labor-intensive, making enforcement and auditing difficult, particularly in large organizations with numerous instances.

B) Applying Organization Policy in combination with Cloud KMS provides centralized and automated enforcement of encryption standards. Organization Policy constraints can mandate that all Cloud SQL instances use Customer-Managed Encryption Keys (CMEK), while Cloud KMS provides secure key management, including creation, rotation, auditing, and lifecycle management. This ensures that encryption is consistently applied across all projects, reduces human error, and allows organizations to maintain strict control over encryption keys, preventing unauthorized access. Audit logs from Cloud KMS further provide visibility into key usage, supporting compliance with regulatory frameworks such as PCI-DSS, HIPAA, and GDPR.

C) IAM deny policies control access to resources but cannot enforce encryption requirements on Cloud SQL instances. While they prevent unauthorized actions, they do not guarantee that instances are using CMEK, making them insufficient for enforcing encryption standards at scale.

D) Cloud Logging alerts capture configuration changes and can notify administrators of misconfigurations, but alerts alone do not prevent noncompliant instances from being created or modifieD) They are reactive rather than proactive, which means they cannot reduce the initial risk of exposure.

By enforcing CMEK through Organization Policy and managing keys with Cloud KMS, organizations ensure strong encryption is applied consistently and automatically. This approach reduces operational risk, supports auditing and compliance, and provides centralized control over encryption, creating a secure production environment where sensitive data is protected and regulatory requirements are met.

Question 199.

An enterprise wants to ensure that all GCP projects inherit security policies such as required CMEK for storage and disabled service account keys. Which solution ensures consistent enforcement?

A) IAM roles only
B) Organization Policy inheritance
C) Cloud Logging monitoring
D) Cloud Functions remediation

Answer: B

Explanation:

A) IAM roles alone are primarily designed to control who can perform specific actions on cloud resources. While they are essential for access management, they do not enforce configuration standards or security policies across multiple projects. Relying solely on IAM roles to maintain compliance with encryption requirements, resource restrictions, or key management practices is insufficient, as users with valid roles could still create resources that violate organizational security policies.

B) Organization Policy inheritance provides a proactive, centralized mechanism to enforce security and compliance requirements across an entire organization. Policies set at the organization or folder level automatically propagate to all child projects, ensuring consistent enforcement of rules such as mandatory Customer-Managed Encryption Keys (CMEK) for storage buckets or the prevention of long-lived service account keys. This automated enforcement reduces the risk of human error, eliminates the need for repetitive manual configuration, and ensures that security best practices are applied uniformly across all projects.

C) Cloud Logging monitoring complements Organization Policy by providing visibility into actions and changes across the cloud environment. Logs capture attempts to modify resources, access sensitive data, or bypass policies. While Cloud Logging is valuable for auditing and compliance reporting, it is reactive in nature and cannot prevent noncompliant actions on its own.

D) Cloud Functions can be integrated with Cloud Logging to automate remediation workflows. For example, if a resource is created in violation of an organization policy, a Cloud Function can trigger corrective actions, such as revoking noncompliant IAM permissions or enforcing required encryption settings. However, without the foundational enforcement provided by Organization Policy inheritance, remediation is always reactive rather than preventive.

By combining Organization Policy inheritance with monitoring and automated remediation, organizations achieve a proactive, scalable, and consistent security posture. Preventive enforcement minimizes misconfigurations, supports regulatory compliance such as HIPAA, PCI-DSS, and SOC 2, and ensures governance at scale. This approach establishes a reliable security baseline across all projects, reduces operational overhead, and enforces centralized control over cloud resources.

Question 200.

A security team wants to ensure that any attempt to exfiltrate data from sensitive BigQuery datasets outside approved networks triggers immediate automated mitigation. Which solution is recommended?

A) VPC Service Controls with perimeter enforcement and Cloud Logging-based automated response
B) IAM roles only
C) Cloud Functions monitoring without enforcement
D) Cloud Armor

Answer: A

Explanation:

A) VPC Service Controls combined with automated Cloud Logging responses provide both preventive and reactive security. VPC Service Controls enforce network perimeters to block unauthorized access or data exfiltration. Cloud Logging detects violations and triggers Cloud Functions for remediation or alerts.

B) IAM roles alone cannot enforce network-level restrictions.

C) Cloud Functions without enforcement only monitor events.

D) Cloud Armor protects web endpoints but does not control service-level data movement. This approach ensures Zero Trust enforcement, regulatory compliance, and automated mitigation of risky activities.