Security-Operations-Engineer Google Cloud Certified - Professional Security Operations Engineer (PSOE) Exam Questions and Answers

Comprehensive and Detailed 150 to 200 words of Explanation From Exact Extract Google Security Operations Engineer documents:

The key requirement is to hunt for unknown C2 nodes. This implies that the indicators will not exist in any current threat intelligence feed. Therefore, Option C is incorrect as it only hunts for known IoCs. Option A is also incorrect as Security Health Analytics (SHA) is a posture management tool, not a threat hunting tool.

Option D describes a classic and effective hypothesis-driven threat hunt. Attackers frequently use Newly Registered Domains (NRDs) for their C2 infrastructure, as these domains have no established reputation and are not yet on blocklists.

Google Security Operations (SecOps) allows an engineer to write a YARA-L rule that joins real-time event data (UDM network traffic) with contextual data (the entity graph or a custom lookup). An engineer can ingest WHOIS data or a feed of NRDs as context. The YARA-L rule would then compare outbound network connections against this context, looking for any communication with domains registered within the last 30-90 days. By executing this rule as a retrohunt, the engineer can scan all historical data to "generate a list of potential matches" for this high-risk, anomalous behavior, which is a strong indicator of unknown C2 activity.

(Reference: Google Cloud documentation, "YARA-L 2.0 language syntax"; "Run a YARA-L retrohunt"; "Context-aware detections with entity graph")

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The correct solution is Option B. This is a common false positive tuning scenario.

The "high priority network indicators" rule set triggers when it sees a connection to or from a known-malicious IP or domain. The problem states the false positives are coming from the on-premises proxy servers.

This implies that the proxy server itself is initiating traffic that matches these indicators. This is often benign, legitimate behavior, such as:

Resolving a user-requested malicious domain via DNS to check its category.

Performing an HTTP HEAD request to a malicious URL to scan it.

Fetching its own threat intelligence or filter updates.

In all these cases, the source of the network connection is the proxy server. In the Unified Data Model (UDM), the source IP of an event is stored in the principal.ip field.

To eliminate these false positives, you must create a rule exclusion (or add a not condition to the rule) that tells the detection engine to ignore any events where the principal.ip is the IP address of your trusted proxy servers. This will not affect the rule's ability to catch a workstation behind the proxy (whose IP would be the principal.ip) connecting through the proxy to a malicious target.ip.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

Curated detection exclusions: Curated detections can be tuned by creating exclusions to reduce false positives from known-benign activity. You can create exclusions based on any UDM field.

Tuning Network Detections: A common source of false positives for network indicator rules is trusted network infrastructure, such as proxies or DNS servers. This equipment may generate traffic to malicious domains or IPs as part of its normal operation (e.g., DNS resolution, content filtering lookups). In this scenario, the traffic originates from the infrastructure device itself. To filter this noise, create an exclusion where the principal.ip field matches the IP address (or IP range) of the trusted proxy server. This prevents the rule from firing on the proxy's administrative traffic while preserving its ability to detect threats from end-user systems.

The correct mechanism for achieving logical data segregation for different customers in a Google Security Operations (SecOps) SOAR multi-tenant environment is by using Environments. The documentation explicitly states that "you can define different environments and environment groups to create logical data segregation." This separation applies to most platform modules, including cases, playbooks, and dashboards.

This feature is specifically designed for this use case: "This process is useful for businesses and Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) who need to segment their operations and networks. Each environment...can represent a separate customer." When an analyst is associated with a specific environment, they can only see the cases and data relevant to that customer, ensuring strict logical separation.

While permission groups (Option C) and roles (Option A) are used to control what a user can do within the platform (e.g., view cases, edit playbooks), they do not provide the primary data segregation. Environments are the top-level containers that separate one customer's data and cases from another's. Playbooks (Option B) are automation workflows and are not a mechanism for logical separation.

(Reference: Google Cloud documentation, "Control access to the platform using SOAR permissions"; "Support multiple instances [SOAR]")

Comprehensive and Detailed 150 to 250 words of Explanation From Exact Extract Google Security Operations Engineer documents:

To execute a playbook on a fixed schedule (once every day) with minimal maintenance, the standard method in Google SecOps SOAR is to utilize a Scheduled Connector (often referred to as a Cron Connector or "Simulate Alert" mechanism).

According to Google Security Operations SOAR documentation, playbooks are primarily triggered by alerts/cases. To run a playbook without an external security event, you must generate a synthetic alert on a schedule. The Cron connector allows you to "configure a schedule (using Cron syntax) to ingest a dummy alert."

You then configure a Playbook Trigger to match this specific dummy alert. When the connector fires at the scheduled time, it creates a case, which matches the trigger, and executes the playbook containing the necessary actions.

This solution is more efficient than Option A (Custom Job) or Option D (External Script) because it utilizes native "No-Code" configuration features, avoids managing external infrastructure, and keeps the logic within the visible Playbook visual editor rather than hidden in IDE code, complying with the "minimizes maintenance overhead" requirement.

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The correct solution is Option A. This scenario requires both data segregation (Requirement 1) and resource sharing (Requirement 2), which is the exact use case for Google SecOps SOAR "Environments."

Google SecOps SOAR (formerly Siemplify) provides a multi-tenancy feature called Environments within a single SOAR tenant. This feature is designed for organizations that need to logically separate data and operations, such as for different business units, geographical regions, or, as in this case, a newly acquired company.

Fulfills Requirement 1 (Data Segregation): Creating a new SOAR environment for Company A ensures that all their ingested alerts and generated cases are isolated within that environment. Analysts assigned only to Company A's environment will not be able to see cases or data from the parent organization's environment.

Fulfills Requirement 2 (Playbook Sharing): Playbooks are managed at the global (tenant) level and can be shared or assigned across multiple environments. This allows Company A's analysts to access and re-purpose the pre-existing playbooks developed by the parent organization, minimizing rework.

Fulfills Requirement 3 (Minimize Effort): This is the built-in, low-effort solution. In contrast, Option D (a second tenant) would be high-effort, costly, and would make sharing playbooks extremely difficult, as tenants are fully isolated. Option B (a new role) controls permissions (e.g., view, edit) but does not inherently segregate data access. Option C (a service account) is for programmatic API access, not for human analysts working in the UI.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

SOAR Environments: Google SecOps SOAR supports multi-tenancy through the use of Environments.6 Environments enable you to maintain data isolation between different logical entities (such as customers, departments, or business units) within the same SOAR instance.7 Each environment functions as a separate workspace, with its own set of cases, alerts, assets, and incident data. This ensures that users and teams operating in one environment cannot access or view data in another, unless they are explicitly granted permission.

Global Resources and Playbooks: While data such as cases is segregated by environment, key SOAR components like playbooks are managed at the global scope. This allows you to create, test, and manage playbooks centrally and then make them available for use across any or all of your environments. This capability enables resource re-use and standardization of response procedures, even in a multi-tenant configuration.

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The correct answer is Option A. This question is about entity context enrichment and aliasing.

Endpoint telemetry from EDR and Windows Event Logs (like 4624) identifies users by their Windows Security Identifier (SID) (e.g., S-1-5-21-12345...). However, detection rules are more effective when they match on a human-readable and consistent identifier, like an email address or username, which is stored in principal.user.userid.

To "connect the dots" between the SID found in endpoint events and the userid, Google SecOps must ingest an authoritative user context data source. In a modern Windows environment, this source is Microsoft Entra ID (formerly Azure AD) or on-premises Active Directory.

Ingesting Entra ID logs as a USER_CONTEXT feed populates the SecOps entity graph. This allows the platform to automatically alias the SID from an endpoint log to the corresponding userid (e.g., jsmith@company.com) at ingestion time. This ensures the principal.user.userid field is correctly populated, allowing the detection rules to match.

Options B, C, and D are all additional event sources (like EDR) and would provide more SIDs, but they do not provide the central directory data needed to perform the aliasing.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

UDM enrichment and aliasing overview: Google Security Operations (SecOps) supports aliasing and enrichment for assets and users. Aliasing enables enrichment. For example, using aliasing, you can find the job title and employment status associated with a user ID.

How aliasing works: User aliasing uses the USER_CONTEXT event type for aliasing. This contextual data is stored as entities in the Entity Graph. When new Unified Data Model (UDM) events are ingested, enrichment uses this aliasing data to add context to the UDM event. For example, an EDR log might contain a principal.windows_sid. The enrichment process queries the entity graph (populated by your Active Directory or Entra ID feed) and populates the principal.user.userid and other fields in the principal.user noun.

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The goal is to automate a decision-making process within a SOAR playbook based on data from an integration. This requires two steps: getting the specific data point (Option E) and then using it in a logical operator (Option A).

Get the Data Point (Option E): The VirusTotal integration returns a detailed JSON object. The most critical data point for determining maliciousness is the number of detections (i.e., how many scanning engines flagged the URL). The playbook must parse this specific value from the JSON output.

Use the Data in Logic (Option A): Once the playbook has the number of detections, it must use a conditional statement (an "If/Then" block) to act on it. This logic is how the playbook makes a recommendation and sets the severity. For example: IF number_of_detections > 3, THEN set severity to CRITICAL and add a comment URL is suspicious. ELSE, set severity to LOW and add a comment URL appears benign.

Option C is incorrect as it describes a manual process, which defeats the purpose of automation. Option D is incorrect as widgets are for displaying data in the case UI, not for executing logic within a playbook.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

Playbook logic and conditional actions: SOAR playbooks execute a series of actions to automate incident response. A core component of this automation is the conditional statement. After an enrichment action (like querying VirusTotal) runs, the playbook can use a conditional block to evaluate the results.

The playbook can parse the JSON output from the integration to extract key values, such as the number of positive detections. This value can then be used in the conditional (e.g., IF detections > 0) to determine the next step, such as setting the alert's severity, escalating to an analyst, or automatically determining if an indicator should be treated as suspicious or benign.

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The correct solution is Option C. Google SecOps SOAR includes a specific, built-in feature to address this exact requirement. The SOAR platform needs to be context-aware to differentiate between internal and external IPs for accurate analysis, prioritization, and playbook execution.

This is achieved by configuring the Environment Networks list within the SOAR settings. Here, an administrator defines all of the organization's internal CIDR ranges (e.g., 10.0.0.0/8, 192.168.0.0/16, 172.16.0.0/12, etc.).

When an alert is ingested from the SIEM (Chronicle) or any other source, the SOAR platform parses its entities. During this ingestion and enrichment process, it automatically cross-references every IP address entity against the configured "Environment Networks" list. If an IP address falls within any of the defined internal CIDR blocks, it is automatically flagged as "Internal." This classification is then visible to analysts in the case and can be used by playbooks to make logical decisions (e.g., initiate an endpoint scan for an internal IP vs. block an external IP at the firewall).

Option A is incorrect because it describes enriching data in the SIEM, not the SOAR ingestion process.

Option B is incorrect because it requires custom connector modification, which is a high-effort solution, whereas a standard, out-of-the-box setting (Option C) already exists.

Option D is incorrect because it describes a post-ingestion playbook action, not a flag set upon ingestion. It's also an unreliable method, as internal assets may not respond to ping due to host firewalls.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

Environment Networks: Google SecOps SOAR provides a configuration setting to define the organization's internal IP address space. This setting, typically found under Organization Settings > Environment Networks within the SOAR platform, allows administrators to list all internal CIDR ranges.

When alerts are ingested into SOAR, the platform automatically enriches entities. During this process, any IP address entity is checked against this defined list. If the IP address falls within one of the specified CIDR blocks, it is automatically marked with an Internal flag. This contextual awareness is critical for analysts to triage cases and for playbooks to execute the correct logic (e.g., different actions for an internal vs. external IP).

This scenario describes an automated external approval, which is a key feature of Google Security Operations (SecOps) SOAR. The solution that "minimizes the effort required by the SOC analyst" is one that is fully automated and does not require the analyst to wait for an email and then manually resume the playbook.

The correct method (Option D) is to use the platform's built-in capabilities (often part of the "Flow" or "Siemplify" integration) to generate a unique approval link (or "Approve" / "Deny" links). These links are tokenized and tied to the specific playbook's execution. This link is then inserted as a placeholder into the email that is sent to the non-SecOps user via the "Send Email" (Gmail integration) action.

The playbook is then configured with conditional logic (e.g., a "Wait for Condition") to pause execution until one of the links is clicked. When the external user clicks the "Approve" or "Deny" link in their email, it sends a secure signal back to the SOAR platform. The playbook automatically detects this response and continues down the appropriate conditional path (e.g., "if approved, execute endpoint containment"). This process is fully automated and requires zero analyst intervention, perfectly meeting the requirements.

Options A, B, and C all require manual analyst action, which violates the core requirement of minimizing analyst effort.

(Reference: Google Cloud documentation, "Google SecOps SOAR Playbooks overview"; "Gmail integration documentation"; "Flow integration - Wait for Approval")

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The correct solution is Option D. The problem is that a known, trusted principal (the backup tool's service account) is performing a legitimate action (storage.objects.list) that happens to look like the suspicious behavior the rule is designed to catch.

The most precise and effective way to reduce these false positives without weakening the rule's ability to catch malicious actors is to create an exception for the trusted principal.

By adding principal.user.email != "backup-bot@fcobaa.com" (or the equivalent principal.user.userid) to the events or condition section of the YARA-L rule, the rule will now only evaluate events where the actor is not the known-good backup bot.

Option A is incorrect because it just lowers the priority of the false positive; it doesn't stop it from being generated.

Option B is incorrect because the legitimate tool might also perform repeated calls, leading to the same false positive.

Option C is incorrect because api.service_name = "storage.googleapis.com" is less specific than api.operation = "storage.objects.list" and would likely increase the number of false positives by triggering on any storage API call.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

Reduce false positives: When a detection rule generates false positives due to known-benign activity (e.g., from an administrative script or automation tool), the best practice is to add a not condition to the rule to exclude the trusted entity.8

You can filter on UDM fields to create exceptions. For example, to prevent a rule from firing on activity from a specific service account, you can add a condition to the events section such as:

and $e.principal.user.userid != "trusted-service-account@project.iam.gserviceaccount.com"

This technique, often called "allow-listing" or "suppression," improves the rule's accuracy by focusing only on unknown or untrusted principals.

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The core task is to evaluate a new tool for fast, low-customization deployment across the entire Google SecOps platform (SIEM and SOAR). This requires checking the two main integration points: data ingestion (SIEM) and automated response (SOAR).

SIEM Ingestion (Option B): To minimize customization for the SIEM, you must verify that Google SecOps can ingest and understand the tool's logs out-of-the-box. This is achieved by checking the Google SecOps documentation for a default parser for that specific tool. If a default parser exists, the logs will be automatically normalized into the Unified Data Model (UDM) upon ingestion, requiring zero custom development.

SOAR Orchestration (Option C): To minimize customization for SOAR, you must verify that pre-built automated actions exist. The Google SecOps Marketplace contains all pre-built SOAR integrations (connectors). By finding the tool in the Marketplace, you can verify which actions (e.g., "Quarantine Host," "Get Process List") are supported, confirming that response playbooks can be built quickly without custom scripting.

Options D and E describe high-effort, custom integration paths, which are the exact opposite of the "minimize customization for faster deployment" requirement.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

Default parsers: Google Security Operations (SecOps) provides a set of default parsers that support many common security products. When logs are ingested from a supported product, SecOps automatically applies the correct parser to normalize the raw log data into the structured Unified Data Model (UDM) format. This is the fastest method to begin ingesting and analyzing new data sources.

Google SecOps Marketplace: The SOAR component of Google SecOps includes a Marketplace that contains a large library of pre-built integrations for common third-party security tools, including EDR, firewalls, and identity providers. Before purchasing a new tool, an engineer should verify its presence in the Marketplace and review the list of supported actions to ensure it meets the organization's automation and orchestration workflow requirements.

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The correct solution is Option B. This question tests the advanced detection capabilities of YARA-L when using the Applied Threat Intelligence (ATI) Fusion Feed.

The key requirement is to find an IP that not only matches but has a documented relationship to APT41. The ATI Fusion Feed is not just a flat list of IOCs; it is a context-rich graph of indicators, malware, threat actors, and their relationships, managed by Google's threat intelligence teams.10

Option A is incorrect because it describes a manual, static list (data table) and cannot query the relationships in the live feed.

Option C is incorrect because it is too generic ("high confidence score," "any feed"). The requirement is specific to the ATI Fusion Feed and APT41.

Option D is incorrect because it describes a post-detection SOAR action. The question explicitly asks how to configure the YARA-L detection rule itself to perform this correlation.

Option B is the only one that describes the correct YARA-L 2.0 methodology. The rule must first define the live event (network connection). Then, it must define the context source (the ATI Fusion Feed). In the events section of the rule, a join is established between the event's external IP field and the IP indicator in the Fusion Feed. Finally, the rule filters the joined context data, looking for attributes such as threat.threat_actor.name = "APT41" or other related_indicators that link back to the specified threat group.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

Applied Threat Intelligence Fusion Feed overview: The Applied Threat Intelligence (ATI) Fusion Feed is a collection of Indicators of Compromise (IoCs), including hashes, IPs, domains, and URLs, that are associated with known threat actors, malware strains, active campaigns, and finished intelligence reporti11ng.12

Write YARA-L rules with the ATI Fusion Feed: Writing YARA-L rules that use the ATI Fusion Feed follows a similar process to writing YARA-L rules that use other context entity sources.13 To write a rule, you filter the selected context entity graph (in this case, Fusion Feed).14

You can join a field from the context entity and UDM event field. In the following example, the placeholder variable ioc is used to do a transitive join between the context entity and the event.

Because this rule can match a large number of events, it is recommended that you refine the rule to match on context entities that have specific intelligence. This allows you to filter for explicit associations, such as a specific threat group or an indicator's presence in a compromised environment.

The most reliable, automated, and low-maintenance solution is to use the native Google Security Operations (SecOps) SOAR capabilities. A playbook block is a reusable, automated workflow that can be attached to other playbooks, such as the standard case closure playbook.

This block would be configured with a conditional action. This action would check a case field (e.g., case.escalation_status == "escalated"). If the condition is true, the playbook automatically proceeds down the "Yes" branch, which would use an integration action (like "Send Email" for Gmail or Outlook) to send the case details to the director. After the email action, it would proceed to the "Close Case" action. If the condition is false (the case was not escalated), the playbook would proceed down the "No" branch, which would skip the email step and immediately close the case.

This method ensures the process is "reliably sent" and "automatic," as it's built directly into the case management logic. Options C and D are incorrect because they rely on manual analyst actions, which are not reliable and violate the "automatic" requirement. Option A is a custom, external solution that adds unnecessary complexity and maintenance overhead compared to the native SOAR playbook functionality.

(Reference: Google Cloud documentation, "Google SecOps SOAR Playbooks overview"; "Playbook blocks"; "Using conditional logic in playbooks")

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation

The correct solution is Option C. The primary constraints are to "streamline" the process, create a "new, functional playbook," get it "as soon as possible," and "use available tools in Google Security Operations."

Google Security Operations integrates Gemini directly into the SOAR platform to accelerate security operations. One of its key capabilities is generative playbook creation. This feature allows an analyst to describe their intended objectives in natural language (e.g., "Create a playbook to investigate and respond to a remote shell alert"). Gemini then generates a complete, logical playbook flow, including investigation, enrichment, containment, and eradication steps.

This generated playbook serves as a high-quality draft. The analyst can then add the necessary customizations (like specific tools, notification endpoints, or contacts for the e-commerce platform) and, most importantly, test the playbook to ensure it is functional and reliable for junior analysts to execute. This workflow directly meets all the prompt's requirements, especially "streamline" and "as soon as possible."

Option D (creating a custom playbook from scratch and using a red team) is the exact opposite of streamlined and fast. Option B involves patching an "outdated" playbook, not creating a new one. Option A incorrectly bundles a specific remediation action (filtering traffic) with the playbook creation process.

Exact Extract from Google Security Operations Documents:

Gemini for Security Operations: Gemini in Google SecOps provides generative AI to assist analysts and engineers. Within the SOAR capability, Gemini can generate entire playbooks from natural language prompts.

Playbook Creation with Gemini: Instead of building a playbook manually, an engineer can describe the intended objectives of the response plan. Gemini will generate a new playbook with a logical structure, including relevant actions and conditional branches. This generated playbook serves as a strong foundation, which can then be refined. The engineer can add necessary customizations to tailor the playbook to the organization's specific environment, tools, and processes. Before deploying the playbook for use by the SOC, it is a best practice to test it against simulated alerts to validate its functionality and ensure it runs as expected.

Comprehensive and Detailed 150 to 250 words of Explanation From Exact Extract Google Security Operations Engineer documents:

The correct method to "quickly tune" a large volume of specific, unwanted findings in Security Command Center (SCC) without disabling the entire detection capability is to use Mute Rules.

According to Security Command Center documentation, "Mute rules allow you to automatically mute findings based on criteria you define. Muted findings are hidden from the Security Command Center dashboard, but they are still logged for audit purposes." This specifically addresses the need to manage volume ("large number") efficiently.

Option A is manual and not scalable ("quickly"). Option B is incorrect because CONFIDENTIAL_COMPUTING_DISABLED is a finding generated by Security Health Analytics (SHA), not Event Threat Detection (ETD). Option D (Disabling SHA) is too broad and would leave the organization blind to other critical misconfigurations; the documentation advises against disabling detectors entirely unless absolutely necessary, preferring mute rules for specific tuning.