ISC2 CISSP Practice Question

The correct answer is following security hardening guidelines from trusted sources. Hardening guidelines from sources like the software vendor, security organizations, or industry standards provide specific, comprehensive recommendations for securely configuring the software. These guidelines typically include disabling unnecessary features, setting secure defaults, and implementing appropriate security controls.

Implementing application-level encryption for all data processed by the software is a specific security control that may be appropriate but is not a comprehensive approach to secure configuration. While encryption is important for protecting sensitive data, it addresses only one aspect of security and might not be implemented correctly without proper guidance.

Deploying the software in a sandboxed environment with behavior monitoring is a defense-in-depth measure that can provide additional security but does not address the secure configuration of the software itself. This approach contains potential damage rather than preventing security issues through proper initial configuration.

Removing all documentation and sample files from production installations is a specific hardening step that helps reduce the attack surface, but it's just one of many configuration actions needed. This single action alone doesn't constitute a comprehensive approach to secure configuration and might miss critical security settings elsewhere in the system.