ISC2 Certified Secure Software Lifecycle Professional (CSSLP) Practice Question

Your fintech company must keep database backups in a public cloud for seven years. Regulations require that the backups remain tamper-proof for the entire retention period, but once the seven years pass you must render the data unrecoverable without physically destroying the provider's media. Which backup architecture choice best meets both regulatory requirements?

Compress and replicate backups to a second cloud region and configure lifecycle rules to delete objects automatically after seven years.
Keep plaintext backups in a private storage bucket and rely on the cloud provider's normal deletion of objects after seven years.
Use server-side encryption with provider-managed keys and enable object versioning so each new backup overwrites the previous one.
Store backups in cloud object storage with WORM retention lock and encrypt them using a customer-managed key kept in a hardware security module, destroying the key after seven years.

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Answer Description

Enabling a write once read many (WORM) retention lock on cloud object storage prevents any alteration or deletion of backup files for the specified period, satisfying the immutability mandate. Encrypting those backups with a customer-managed key that is held in a hardware security module allows the organization to perform cryptographic erasure: when the retention period ends, destroying the key makes the ciphertext permanently unrecoverable even though the encrypted data remain on the provider's disks. The other options fail at least one requirement. Simply replicating and later deleting objects relies on provider deletion processes that may not guarantee immutability or immediate destruction. Provider-managed server-side encryption does not give the organization control of the keys, so it cannot assure timely cryptographic erasure. Storing plaintext backups and trusting standard deletion provides neither assured immutability nor secure destruction.

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