ECCouncil 212-89 (EC-Council Certified Incident Handler) Practice Test 69

Question 680

During lessons learned, the security owner reviews this completed incident: A router configuration backup exists only on the router that may have been modified by an intruder. Which repeatable safeguard best prevents this failure mode in the future?

  1. Maintain immutable off-device network configuration backups
  2. Compare current running configuration with an independently retained approved backup
  3. Test network visibility during red-team and incident exercises
  4. Restore a verified approved configuration and rotate device administration secrets

Explanation

Correct Answer

A:

Independent baselines support dependable incident recovery; this turns the weakness behind whether trusted baseline configurations are available into a measurable prevention requirement.

Incorrect Answers

B:

A local copy could share the compromised state or have been overwritten; when judging whether trusted baseline configurations are available, an investigation is not recurrence prevention; this is instead evidence validation.

C:

Coverage validation reveals gaps missed by perimeter-only monitoring; that method could help with whether network monitoring sees suspected east-west movement; the recurrence prevention decision here involves whether trusted baseline configurations are available.

D:

A known-good baseline addresses configuration and credential compromise; the requirement concerns whether trusted baseline configurations are available, so case recovery is not future-risk control.

Question 681

A containment decision is required for this incident: An API service fails under a small number of computationally expensive authenticated search requests. What action constrains the incident at the affected point of control?

  1. Apply endpoint-specific rate limits and cost caps to abusive clients
  2. Restrict recursion to approved clients and apply query-rate controls
  3. Correlate endpoint latency, query cost, authenticated caller and request frequency
  4. Optimize expensive queries and confirm capacity after controls apply

Explanation

Correct Answer

A:

Application-aware throttling targets expensive requests; it restricts the path implicated in whether application-layer resource exhaustion is responsible; later eradication and restoration remain separate decisions.

Incorrect Answers

B:

Narrowing who can request expensive recursion reduces immediate demand; it is meant to address whether resolver resource exhaustion is the outage cause, not initial containment or preservation for whether application-layer resource exhaustion is responsible.

C:

Low-volume requests can exhaust CPU or database resources without a volumetric flood; when judging whether application-layer resource exhaustion is responsible, investigation alone does not control current conditions; this is instead evidence validation.

D:

A sustainable fix addresses resource amplification; for whether application-layer resource exhaustion is responsible, corrective follow-through follows initial protection; initial containment or preservation remains necessary.

Question 682

The first task is to corroborate an alert. The case notes state: Wireless monitoring detects repeated deauthentication frames that disconnect staff devices from legitimate access points. What should the investigator examine to distinguish a substantiated finding from an assumption?

  1. Correlate switch port MAC learning, DHCP leases and wireless beacon inventory
  2. Use protected management frames where supported and monitor rogue radio activity
  3. Locate the interference source and follow authorized radio incident procedures
  4. Examine 802.11 management frame capture, source addresses and AP association events

Explanation

Correct Answer

D:

Deauthentication floods can cause disconnections without normal data traffic; this permits a traceable finding about whether management-frame abuse is causing client disruption before the team makes a disruptive change.

Incorrect Answers

A:

An unauthorized bridge may provide wireless access to internal resources; the activity targets whether a rogue AP bridges a protected wired segment; evidence validation here concerns whether management-frame abuse is causing client disruption.

B:

PMF reduces spoofed management-frame effects; the goal is evidence validation for whether management-frame abuse is causing client disruption. Prevention is not incident verification.

C:

Physical investigation and client protection are safer than unauthorized jamming; immediate protection does not substantiate findings in the decision about whether management-frame abuse is causing client disruption.

Question 683

The response team seeks the relevant control point for this problem: An employee routes corporate traffic through an unauthorized consumer VPN service to evade approved content restrictions. What protection would be proportionate to the observed incident?

  1. Remove the tunnel client and review affected access and policy violations
  2. Block unapproved tunnel clients through application-aware controls
  3. Inspect process, destination and TLS session telemetry against allowed VPN inventory
  4. Revoke the relay's access and restrict unauthorized remote-control clients

Explanation

Correct Answer

B:

Containment restores monitored egress paths while preserving logs; this is a first-response safeguard for whether unsanctioned tunneling bypasses inspection, not a substitute for full root-cause analysis.

Incorrect Answers

A:

Response should determine whether sensitive data crossed the alternate channel; the requirement concerns whether unsanctioned tunneling bypasses inspection, so corrective follow-through follows initial protection.

C:

Encrypted traffic may hide unauthorized routing without proving the underlying payload; investigation alone does not control current conditions in the decision about whether unsanctioned tunneling bypasses inspection.

D:

Containment restores the sanctioned management boundary; it is meant to address whether tunneled remote administration violates access policy, not initial containment or preservation for whether unsanctioned tunneling bypasses inspection.

Question 684

A tabletop exercise is being updated using the following real-world failure: A security analyst sees multiple TCP resets but mistakes them for proof of an active denial-of-service attack. Which improvement should be tracked through the next control-assurance cycle?

  1. Set baselines for connection rates and service health indicators
  2. Inspect packet rates, response codes and service availability together
  3. Alert on reconnaissance followed by successful authentication or exploit evidence
  4. Document observed causes and tune anomaly detection to actual service degradation

Explanation

Correct Answer

A:

Context improves network anomaly classification; this turns the weakness behind whether resets reflect malicious flooding or normal session behavior into a measurable prevention requirement.

Incorrect Answers

B:

Resets can arise from policy, application behavior or deliberate interference; an investigation is not recurrence prevention in the decision about whether resets reflect malicious flooding or normal session behavior.

C:

Multi-stage detection prioritizes consequential activity; it is meant to address whether the traffic represents probing rather than established access, not recurrence prevention for whether resets reflect malicious flooding or normal session behavior.

D:

Validated outcomes distinguish incident response from noise; when judging whether resets reflect malicious flooding or normal session behavior, case recovery is not future-risk control; this is instead trusted restoration.

Question 685

Cleanup is not considered complete. The case record describes: A web team cannot roll back an emergency code fix because database migrations are irreversible. Which remediation task is necessary rather than merely suppressing the visible symptom?

  1. Pause further migrations and preserve database state before emergency remediation
  2. Design reversible migrations and validate backups before high-risk deployments
  3. Review deployment artifacts, migration scripts and restore test evidence
  4. Increase scoped retention and exercise event retrieval for test incidents
  5. Use tested forward-fix or compatible restore procedures with application owners

Explanation

Correct Answer

E:

Recovery must preserve data consistency across versions; the affected workflow should not be considered trusted until the issue of whether recovery procedures cover schema changes is resolved.

Incorrect Answers

A:

Capturing state protects against compounding corruption; the requirement concerns whether recovery procedures cover schema changes, so temporary protection does not complete correction.

B:

Release engineering improves incident recovery options; the goal is trusted restoration for whether recovery procedures cover schema changes. Future hardening is not current-state recovery.

C:

A code rollback alone may be unsafe after schema or data changes; verification is not the corrective step in the decision about whether recovery procedures cover schema changes.

D:

Readiness requires that investigators can actually obtain necessary logs; the other incident centers on whether web incident readiness includes sufficient evidence, not this trusted restoration question about whether recovery procedures cover schema changes.

Question 686

Forensic review begins with this reported event: A development team disables TLS certificate verification in a payment integration to avoid a staging certificate error. Which evidence-based task answers the primary uncertainty?

  1. Review TLS validation settings and actual certificate chain
  2. Install a trusted staging certificate and validate production trust configuration
  3. Restore certificate checks and pause unsafe payment calls
  4. Test certificate validation and pinning policies where appropriate in CI
  5. Inspect CSP, iframe and mixed-content behavior on affected routes

Explanation

Correct Answer

A:

Skipping verification permits interception or impersonation regardless of encryption; it connects the question of whether client connections authenticate the remote service to an observable record and a reproducible check.

Incorrect Answers

B:

Correct trust repair avoids an insecure global workaround; the requirement concerns whether client connections authenticate the remote service, so recovery is not factual verification.

C:

Authenticated transport is necessary before sensitive transaction exchange; the goal is evidence validation for whether client connections authenticate the remote service. Immediate protection does not substantiate findings.

D:

Transport verification should not be bypassed to fix compatibility; prevention is not incident verification in the decision about whether client connections authenticate the remote service.

E:

Removing all headers increases attack surface beyond the one integration; that method could help with whether broad browser-policy relaxation created exposure; the evidence validation decision here involves whether client connections authenticate the remote service.

Question 687

The owner must verify the return to a trusted state for the following: A web server exposes backup archive files under a publicly reachable static-assets directory. What corrective work is needed before routine operations resume?

  1. Exclude backups from web roots and scan builds for secret-bearing artifacts
  2. Purge or protect historical token logs and revoke affected credentials
  3. Remove external access to backups and preserve access logs for scope analysis
  4. Move archives to restricted storage and rotate any exposed secrets

Explanation

Correct Answer

D:

Recovery must account for content already obtainable; the recovery decision is tied to whether sensitive files are retrievable without authentication, not merely to reduced alert volume.

Incorrect Answers

A:

Deployment checks prevent accidental publication; the requirement concerns whether sensitive files are retrievable without authentication, so future hardening is not current-state recovery.

B:

Previous records may still contain usable authorization material; it is meant to address whether telemetry itself leaks credentials, not trusted restoration for whether sensitive files are retrievable without authentication.

C:

Immediate blocking stops further unauthenticated download; temporary protection does not complete correction in the decision about whether sensitive files are retrievable without authentication.

Question 688

A security analyst is asked to validate the following reported behavior: An XML processing endpoint unexpectedly reads a local server file after receiving an external entity declaration. Which check can confirm the relevant facts before a disruptive action?

  1. Use hardened XML libraries and regression tests for entity inputs
  2. Inspect parser configuration and document content against file access events
  3. Disable external entity resolution and restrict the parsing endpoint
  4. Trace the redirect chain and inspect the server's destination validation

Explanation

Correct Answer

B:

Unsafe entity expansion can read local files or access internal network resources; that evidence directly tests the concern about whether XML external entities are enabled, rather than relying on a single unverified indicator.

Incorrect Answers

A:

Safe parsing is stronger than ad hoc payload filtering; the goal is evidence validation for whether XML external entities are enabled. Prevention is not incident verification.

C:

Removing the parser feature stops additional data access; the case needs evidence validation addressing whether XML external entities are enabled; immediate protection does not substantiate findings.

D:

An attacker-controlled URL parameter may send users beyond the trusted origin; the relevant condition for that step is whether an open redirect is being abused, which is not shown for whether XML external entities are enabled.

Question 689

The immediate risk must be managed. The response record describes: A customer support portal submits state-changing requests without an anti-CSRF control and browsers attach valid session cookies. Which intervention is most effective before full eradication or restoration?

  1. Implement server-verified CSRF tokens and review unauthorized changes
  2. Revoke exposed tokens and reduce session lifetimes while investigating
  3. Inspect request origin validation, CSRF tokens and cookie SameSite attributes
  4. Temporarily restrict high-risk state changes while adding origin checks

Explanation

Correct Answer

D:

Focused mitigation limits unintended requests during remediation; this reduces current exposure associated with whether cross-site request forgery is possible and permits later corrective work.

Incorrect Answers

A:

Protection must be checked on the server for each sensitive action; the case needs initial containment or preservation addressing whether cross-site request forgery is possible; corrective follow-through follows initial protection.

B:

Invalidating active credentials limits session hijacking; the activity targets whether session invalidation is ineffective; initial containment or preservation here concerns whether cross-site request forgery is possible.

C:

Cross-origin requests can exploit ambient authenticated browser state; for whether cross-site request forgery is possible, investigation alone does not control current conditions; initial containment or preservation remains necessary.

Question 690

The incident is not yet closed. Response staff report: A user profile field reflects unescaped script markup and browsers execute it when other users view the profile. Which short-term measure protects the affected process or asset?

  1. Disable affected rendering and sanitize the malicious stored payload carefully
  2. Compare stored profile content with rendered DOM and browser execution evidence
  3. Disable role mutation on the vulnerable endpoint and review newly elevated accounts
  4. Apply context-aware output encoding and assess impacted sessions

Explanation

Correct Answer

A:

Containment removes immediate script execution without destroying evidence; it protects the affected workflow while investigators continue resolving whether stored cross-site scripting occurs.

Incorrect Answers

B:

Persistent malicious markup can execute in other users' sessions; for whether stored cross-site scripting occurs, investigation alone does not control current conditions; initial containment or preservation remains necessary.

C:

Containment removes the direct privilege escalation path; the relevant condition for that step is whether mass assignment permits privilege escalation, which is not shown for whether stored cross-site scripting occurs.

D:

Encoding at the output context addresses the underlying flaw; the goal is initial containment or preservation for whether stored cross-site scripting occurs. Corrective follow-through follows initial protection.

EC-Council Certified Incident Handler (212-89) Practice Tests