Amazon Web Services Updated SCS-C03 Exam Questions and Answers by alaya

Amazon Inspector provides native CI/CD integration capabilities that allow security checks to occur before container images are pushed to Amazon ECR. According to AWS Certified Security – Specialty documentation, Inspector does not block image pushes automatically. Instead, prevention must occur inside the CI/CD pipeline itself.

By generating a Software Bill of Materials (SBOM) using the Amazon Inspector SBOM generator and submitting it to Inspector for scanning, the pipeline can detect critical vulnerabilities before the image is uploaded. If vulnerabilities exceed policy thresholds, the pipeline fails, preventing deployment.

Post-push scanning solutions only detect vulnerabilities after exposure. Event-driven blocking does not prevent the initial risk.

AWS best practices require “shift-left” security controls to prevent vulnerable artifacts from entering production.

Referenced AWS Specialty Documents:

AWS Certified Security – Specialty Official Study Guide

Amazon Inspector CI/CD Integration

Amazon Macie is the AWS service designed specifically to discover, classify, and inventory sensitive data stored in Amazon S3. According to the AWS Certified Security – Specialty Study Guide, Macie can be enabled organization-wide using AWS Organizations, with a delegated administrator account that centrally manages findings across all member accounts.

By designating the security account as the delegated administrator for both Amazon Macie and AWS Security Hub, the company can centralize sensitive data findings in a single location. Macie automatically scans S3 buckets for sensitive data such as personally identifiable information (PII) and publishes findings to Security Hub for centralized visibility and reporting.

Option B and C are incorrect because Amazon Inspector does not scan S3 objects for sensitive data. Option D is invalid because AWS Trusted Advisor does not ingest Macie sensitive data findings.

AWS best practices recommend Amazon Macie with delegated administration and Security Hub integration for centralized sensitive data inventory across multi-account environments.

Referenced AWS Specialty Documents:

AWS Certified Security – Specialty Official Study Guide

Amazon Macie Sensitive Data Discovery

AWS Organizations Delegated Administrator Model

AWS Security Hub Integration Overview

AWS KMS supports additional authenticated data (AAD) through the use of encryption context. According to the AWS Certified Security – Specialty documentation, encryption context is a set of key-value pairs that is cryptographically bound to the ciphertext. Any attempt to decrypt the data must include the same encryption context, or decryption will fail. This mechanism protects against ciphertext tampering and unauthorized reuse.

The kms:EncryptionContext condition key allows security engineers to enforce the use of specific encryption context values in IAM or key policies. By defining conditions that require particular encryption context attributes, access to encrypted data can be tightly controlled and bound to specific applications, environments, or workflows.

Option A does not provide integrity protection. Option B controls access but does not enforce the use of AAD. Option D restricts administrative access but does not address encryption context enforcement.

AWS documentation explicitly states that encryption context combined with policy conditions is the recommended method to implement authenticated encryption and fine-grained access control with KMS.

Referenced AWS Specialty Documents:

AWS Certified Security – Specialty Official Study Guide

AWS KMS Encryption Context

AWS KMS Policy Condition Keys

AWS IAM Identity Center relies on SAML assertions and attribute mappings to associate federated users with identities, groups, and permission sets. According to the AWS Certified Security – Specialty documentation, when changing identity providers while maintaining the same underlying directory, existing users and group identities can be preserved by updating attribute mappings to align with the new IdP’s SAML assertions.

By modifying the attribute mappings, IAM Identity Center can correctly interpret usernames, group memberships, and unique identifiers sent by the new IdP without requiring changes to AWS account roles or permission sets. This approach minimizes operational effort and avoids disruption to access management.

Option A unnecessarily disables identities and causes access outages. Option C is incorrect because IAM Identity Center abstracts role trust relationships, and roles do not directly trust the IdP. Option D is unrelated to federation source configuration and only affects authentication timing issues.

AWS best practices recommend updating attribute mappings when switching IdPs that share the same directory source.

Referenced AWS Specialty Documents:

AWS Certified Security – Specialty Official Study Guide

AWS IAM Identity Center SAML Federation

AWS Identity Federation Best Practices