CompTIA Security+ Question F-90

Which the following flags are used to establish a TCP connection? (Select TWO).

A. PSH
B. ACK
C. SYN
D. URG
E. FIN

Answer: B,C

Explanation:
To establish a TCP connection, the three-way (or 3-step) handshake occurs:

SYN: The active open is performed by the client sending a SYN to the server. The client sets the segment’s sequence number to a random value A. SYN-ACK: In response, the server replies with a SYN-ACK. The acknowledgment number is set to one more than the received sequence number i.e. A+1, and the sequence number that the server chooses for the packet is another random number, B. ACK: Finally, the client sends an ACK back to the server. The sequence number is set to the received acknowledgement value i.e. A+1, and the acknowledgement number is set to one more than the received sequence number i.e. B+1.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-89

Human Resources suspect an employee is accessing the employee salary database. The administrator is asked to find out who it is. In order to complete this task, which of the following is a security control that should be in place?

A. Shared accounts should be prohibited.
B. Account lockout should be enabled
C. Privileges should be assigned to groups rather than individuals
D. Time of day restrictions should be in use

Answer: A

Explanation:
Since distinguishing between the actions of one person and another isn’t possible if they both use a shared account, shared accounts should not be allowed. If shared accounts are being used, the administrator will find the account, but have more than one suspect. To nullify this occurrence, Shared accounts should be prohibited.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-88

An administrator is instructed to disable IP-directed broadcasts on all routers in an organization. Which of the following attacks does this prevent?

A. Pharming
B. Smurf
C. Replay
D. Xmas

Answer: B

Explanation:
A smurf attack is a type of network security breach in which a network connected to the Internet is swamped with replies to ICMP echo (PING) requests. A smurf attacker sends PING requests to an Internet broadcast address. These are special addresses that broadcast all received messages to the hosts connected to the subnet. Each broadcast address can support up to 255 hosts, so a single PING request can be multiplied 255 times. The return address of the request itself is spoofed to be the address of the attacker’s victim. All the hosts receiving the PING request reply to this victim’s address instead of the real sender’s address. A single attacker sending hundreds or thousands of these PING messages per second can fill the victim’s Internet connection with ping replies, bringing their entire Internet service to its knees. Smurfing falls under the general category of Denial of Service attacks — security attacks that don’t try to steal information, but instead attempt to disable a computer or network.

By disabling IP-directed broadcasts on all routers, we can prevent the smurf attack by blocking the ping requests to broadcast addresses.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-87

Which of the following BEST describes a SQL Injection attack?

A. The attacker attempts to have the receiving server pass information to a back-end database from which it can compromise the stored information.
B. The attacker attempts to have the receiving server run a payload using programming commonly found on web servers.
C. The attacker overwhelms a system or application, causing it to crash and bring the server down to cause an outage.
D. The attacker overwhelms a system or application, causing it to crash, and then redirects the memory address to read from a location holding the payload.

Answer: A

Explanation:
SQL injection is a code injection technique, used to attack data-driven applications, in which malicious SQL statements are inserted into an entry field for execution (e.g. to dump the database contents to the attacker). SQL injection must exploit a security vulnerability in an application’s software, for example, when user input is either incorrectly filtered for string literal escape characters embedded in SQL statements or user input is not strongly typed and unexpectedly executed. SQL injection is mostly known as an attack vector for websites but can be used to attack any type of SQL database.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-86

Which of the following is a control that allows a mobile application to access and manipulate information which should only be available by another application on the same mobile device (e.g. a music application posting the name of the current song playing on the device on a social media site)?

A. Co-hosted application
B. Transitive trust
C. Mutually exclusive access
D. Dual authentication

Answer: B

Explanation:
Transitive trust is a form of trust that flows from one entity to another so that if A trusts B and B trusts C, A automatically trusts C.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-85

Which of the following helps to apply the proper security controls to information?

A. Data classification
B. Deduplication
C. Clean desk policy
D. Encryption

Answer: A

Explanation:
Information classification is done by confidentiality and comprises of three categories, namely: public use, internal use and restricted use. These categories make applying the appropriate policies and security controls practical.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-84

A computer security officer has investigated a possible data breach and has found it credible. The officer notifies the data center manager and the Chief Information Security Officer (CISO). This is an example of:

A. escalation and notification.
B. first responder.
C. incident identification.
D. incident mitigation.

Answer: A

Explanation:
Escalation and notification is a response strategy that outlines a staged procedure of escalation and notification that is to be followed in the event of a security incident. Only those in specific positions of authority or responsibility must receive notification of the security breach.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-83

The security consultant is assigned to test a client’s new software for security, after logs show targeted attacks from the Internet. To determine the weaknesses, the consultant has no access to the application program interfaces, code, or data structures. This is an example of which of the following types of testing?

A. Black box
B. Penetration
C. Gray box
D. White box

Answer: A

Explanation:
Black-box testing is a method of software testing that examines the functionality of an application without peering into its internal structures or workings. This method of test can be applied to virtually every level of software testing: unit, integration, system and acceptance. It typically comprises most if not all higher level testing, but can also dominate unit testing as well. Specific knowledge of the application’s code/internal structure and programming knowledge in general is not required. The tester is aware of what the software is supposed to do but is not aware of how it does it. For instance, the tester is aware that a particular input returns a certain, invariable output but is not aware of how the software produces the output in the first place.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-82

A software development company wants to implement a digital rights management solution to protect its intellectual property. Which of the following should the company implement to enforce software digital rights?

A. Transport encryption
B. IPsec
C. Non-repudiation
D. Public key infrastructure

Answer: D

Explanation:
The Public-Key Infrastructure (PKI) is intended to offer a means of providing security to messages and transactions on a grand scale. The need for universal systems to support e-commerce, secure transactions, and information privacy is one aspect of the issues being addressed with PKI. A PKI can be used to protect software.

CompTIA Security+ Question F-81

A company wants to ensure that all credentials for various systems are saved within a central database so that users only have to login once for access to all systems. Which of the following would accomplish this?

A. Multi-factor authentication
B. Smart card access
C. Same Sign-On
D. Single Sign-On

Answer: D

Explanation:
Single sign-on means that once a user (or other subject) is authenticated into a realm, re-authentication is not required for access to resources on any realm entity. Single sign-on is able to internally translate and store credentials for the various mechanisms, from the credential used for original authentication.