Free CREST CPTIA Practice Exam with Questions & Answers

Static analysis involves examining the malware's memory dumps or binary codes without executing the code. This technique is used to find traces of malware by analyzing the code to understand its purpose, functionality, and potential impact. Static analysis allows for the identification of malicious signatures, strings, or other indicators of compromise within the malware's code. This method is contrasted with dynamic analysis, which studies the malware's behavior during execution, live system analysis, which examines running systems, and intrusion analysis, which focuses on detecting and analyzing breaches.

In the risk assessment process, calculating the probability that a threat source will exploit an existing system vulnerability is known as likelihood analysis. This step involves evaluating how probable it is that the organization's vulnerabilities can be exploited by potential threats, considering various factors such as the nature of the vulnerability, the presence and capability of threat actors, and the effectiveness of current controls. Elizabeth's task of assessing the probability of exploitation is crucial for understanding the risk level associated with different vulnerabilities and for prioritizing risk mitigation efforts based on the likelihood of occurrence.

References:The Certified Incident Handler (CREST CPTIA) program by EC-Council includes detailed discussions on risk assessment methodologies, where likelihood analysis is highlighted as a key component in evaluating risks to organizational security.

Threat Grid is a threat intelligence and analysis platform that offers advanced capabilities for automatic data collection, filtering, and analysis. It is designed to help organizations convert raw threat data into meaningful, actionable intelligence. By employing advanced analytics and machine learning, Threat Grid can reduce noise from large data sets, helping to eliminate misrepresentations and enhance the quality of the threat intelligence. This makes it an ideal choice for Tim, who is looking to address the challenges of converting raw data into contextual information and managing the noise from massive data collections.References:

"Cisco Threat Grid: Unify Your Threat Defense," Cisco

"Integrating and Automating Threat Intelligence," by Threat Grid

The attack described, where multiple connection requests from different geo-locations are received by a server within a short time span leading to stress and reduced performance, is indicative of a Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attack. In a DDoS attack, the attacker floods the target's resources (such as a server) with excessive requests from multiple sources, making it difficult for the server to handle legitimate traffic, leading to degradation or outright unavailability of service. The use of multiple geo-locations for the attack sources is a common characteristic of DDoS attacks, making them harder to mitigate.References:

"Understanding Denial-of-Service Attacks," US-CERT

"DDoS Quick Guide," DHS/NCCIC

Logging User IDs (D) can pose privacy concerns and may conflict with regulations such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which emphasizes the protection of personal data and privacy. Therefore, while logging details such as Timestamps, Session IDs, and Source IP addresses are essential for security auditing to track when events occur, who is initiating sessions, and from where, care must be taken with User IDs. The handling of personally identifiable information (PII) must comply with privacy laws and organizational policies to safeguard individual privacy rights.

References:Security best practices and compliance frameworks discussed in the CREST guide incident handlers on what information should and should not be logged, emphasizing the need to balance security auditing requirements with privacy and regulatory obligations.

A side channel attack, as described in the scenario, involves an attacker using indirect methods to gather information from a system. In this case, Alice is exploiting the shared physical resources, specifically the processor cache, of a virtual machine host to steal data from another virtual machine on the same host. This type of attack does not directly breach the system through conventional means like breaking encryption but instead takes advantage of the information leaked by the physical implementation of the system, such as timing information, power consumption, electromagnetic leaks, or, as in this case, shared resource utilization, to infer the secret data.

References:The EC-Council's Certified Incident Handler (CREST CPTIA) program covers various types of cyber attacks, including advanced techniques like side channel attacks, highlighting the need for comprehensive security strategies that consider both direct and indirect attack vectors.

Normalization in the context of data analysis refers to the process of organizing data to reduce redundancy and improve efficiency in storing and sharing. By filtering, tagging, and queuing, Miley is effectively normalizing the data—converting it from various unstructured formats into a structured, more accessible format. This makes the data easierto analyze, store, and share. Normalization is crucial in cybersecurity and threat intelligence to manage the vast amounts of data collected and ensure that only relevant data is retained and analyzed. This technique contrasts with sandboxing, which is used for isolating and analyzing suspicious code; data visualization, which involves representing data graphically; and convenience sampling, which is a method of sampling where samples are taken from a group that is conveniently accessible.References:

"The Application of Data Normalization to Database Security," International Journal of Computer Science Issues

SANS Institute Reading Room, "Data Normalization Considerations in Cyber Threat Intelligence"

In Wireshark, the filtericmp.type==8is used to detect ping sweep attempts. ICMP type 8 messages are echo requests, which are used in ping operations to check the availability of a network device. A ping sweep involves sending ICMP echo requests to multiple addresses to discover active devices on a network. By filtering for ICMP type 8 messages in Wireshark, Bran can identify these echo requests, helping to pinpoint ping sweep activities on the network.

References:Wireshark, as a network protocol analyzer, is frequently discussed in the CREST CPTIA program, with particular emphasis on its utility in detecting network reconnaissance activities like ping sweeps through specific filter usage.

Netcraft is a tool that provides internet security services, including the detection of phishing and spam emails. It offers a range of services that can help organizations identify fraudulent websites and phishing activities by analyzing web content and email messages for known phishing signatures and heuristics. This makes it a useful tool for incident handlers like Francis, who is tasked with detecting phishing and spam emails for client organizations. Other options listed, such as Nessus (a vulnerability scanner), BTCrack (a Bluetooth pin and link-key cracker), and Cain and Abel (a password recovery tool), do not specialize in detecting phishing or spam emails but serve different purposes in cybersecurity.References:The Incident Handler (CREST CPTIA) curriculum includes discussions on tools and methodologies for detecting and mitigating various cyber threats, including phishing and spam, highlighting tools like Netcraft for their utility in these areas.

BinText is a lightweight text extraction tool that can be used to perform string search analysis within binary files. This functionality is crucial for incident handlers like Jason, who are tasked with analyzing memory dumps for malicious activity or indicators of compromise. By searching for specific strings or patterns that are known to be associated with malware, BinText helps in identifying potentially harmful actions that a program could perform, thus aiding in the investigation of malware incidents.

References:Memory dump analysis and string search techniques are important skills covered in the CREST CPTIA curriculum, emphasizing the use of tools like BinText to aid in the forensic analysis of malware-infected systems.