Apprentice Practice Questions

Two of the four Cs of cloud-native security are Code and Clusters. The four-Cs model is commonly used to organize cloud-native security responsibilities across layers: cloud, cluster, container, and code. Code is the application logic and dependencies that developers produce, and it must be secured through review, scanning, dependency management, and secrets control. Cluster refers to the orchestration environment that runs workloads, commonly Kubernetes, and must be secured through access control, configuration hardening, network policy, and runtime monitoring. Configurations are extremely important in cloud security, but “Configurations” is not one of the four Cs in this model. Connections are also important, especially for service communication and network policy, but they are not one of the named four Cs. The model is useful because cloud-native risk is layered: weak code, vulnerable containers, misconfigured clusters, or insecure cloud infrastructure can each become an attack path. Reference/topics: Cloud Security 5.5, CNSP; Cloud Security 5.4, container, microservice, and cloud terms.

Internet of Things devices are specialized connected devices that communicate over networks but are not general-purpose user workstations. A security camera is a common IoT device because it collects video, connects to a network, and is often managed remotely. A patient imaging machine is also an IoT or medical IoT device because it is a specialized connected system used in healthcare environments to collect or process clinical data. These devices often have embedded operating systems, unique protocols, long replacement cycles, and limited local security controls. A laptop is an endpoint, but it is a general-purpose computing device rather than a typical IoT device. A router is a network infrastructure device; although some consumer routers have smart features, the certification context distinguishes infrastructure devices from IoT examples. IoT security matters because these devices can expand the attack surface, may be difficult to patch, and often require visibility and segmentation. Palo Alto Networks places IoT devices and endpoints under the Endpoint Security domain. Reference: Cybersecurity Apprentice Datasheet, Endpoint Security 4.1.