Splunk SPLK-5002 Splunk Certified Cybersecurity Defense Engineer Exam Practice Test

Answer : A, B, D

Effective security reporting helps SOC teams, executives, and compliance officers make informed decisions.

1. Automating Report Generation (A)

Saves time by scheduling reports for regular distribution.

Reduces manual effort and ensures timely insights.

Example:

A weekly phishing attack report sent to SOC analysts.

2. Customizing Reports for Different Audiences (B)

Technical reports for SOC teams include detailed event logs.

Executive summaries provide risk assessments and trends.

Example:

SOC analysts see incident logs, while executives get a risk summary.

3. Providing Actionable Recommendations (D)

Reports should not just show data but suggest actions.

Example:

If failed login attempts increase, recommend MFA enforcement.

Incorrect Answers:

C . Including unrelated historical data for context Reports should be concise and relevant.

E . Using dynamic filters for better analysis Useful in dashboards, but not a primary factor in reporting effectiveness.

Additional Resources:

Splunk Security Reporting Guide

Best Practices for Security Metrics

Answer : B, D

Summary indexing in Splunk improves search efficiency by storing pre-aggregated data, reducing the need to process large datasets repeatedly.

Key Benefits of Summary Indexing:

Improves Search Performance on Aggregated Data (B)

Reduces query execution time by storing pre-calculated results.

Helps SOC teams analyze trends without running resource-intensive searches.

Increases Data Retention Period (D)

Raw logs may have short retention periods, but summary indexes can store key insights for longer.

Useful for historical trend analysis and compliance reporting.

Incorrect Answers: A. Reduces storage space required for raw data -- Summary indexing creates additional storage, rather than reducing raw data size. C. Provides automatic field extraction during indexing -- Field extraction is not automatic in summary indexing; it depends on how data is processed.

Splunk Summary Indexing Best Practices

Improving Search Performance with Summary Indexing

Answer : A, C

An audit report provides an overview of security operations, compliance adherence, and past incidents, helping organizations ensure regulatory compliance and improve security posture.

Key Elements of an Audit Report:

Analysis of Past Incidents (A)

Includes details on security breaches, alerts, and investigations.

Helps identify recurring threats and security gaps.

Compliance Metrics (C)

Evaluates adherence to regulatory frameworks (e.g., NIST, ISO 27001, PCI-DSS, GDPR).

Measures risk scores, policy violations, and control effectiveness.

Incorrect Answers: B. List of unprocessed log data -- Unprocessed logs do not contribute to security insights in an audit report. D. Asset inventory details -- While asset tracking is important, audit reports focus on security and compliance data.

Security Audit Reports Best Practices

Splunk Compliance and Audit Frameworks

Answer : B

Splunk SOAR (Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response) helps SOC teams automate threat detection, investigation, and response by integrating security tools and orchestrating workflows.

Primary Purpose of Splunk SOAR:

Automates Security Tasks (B)

Reduces manual efforts by using playbooks to handle routine incidents automatically.

Accelerates threat mitigation by automating response actions (e.g., blocking malicious IPs, isolating endpoints).

Orchestrates Security Workflows (B)

Connects SIEM, threat intelligence, firewalls, endpoint security, and ITSM tools into a unified security workflow.

Ensures faster and more effective threat response across multiple security tools.

Incorrect Answers: A. To accelerate data ingestion -- Splunk SOAR focuses on incident response automation, not data ingestion. C. To improve indexing performance -- Indexing is managed by Splunk Enterprise, not Splunk SOAR. D. To provide threat intelligence feeds -- While SOAR can use threat intelligence, it does not provide them.

Splunk SOAR Overview

Automating Incident Response with Splunk SOAR

Answer : A

MITRE ATT&CK is a threat intelligence framework that helps security teams map attack techniques to detection rules.

1. Develop Custom Detection Rules Based on Attack Techniques (A)

Maps Splunk correlation searches to MITRE ATT&CK techniques to detect adversary behaviors.

Example:

To detect T1078 (Valid Accounts):

index=auth_logs action=failed | stats count by user, src_ip

If an account logs in from anomalous locations, trigger an alert.

Incorrect Answers:

B . Use it only for reporting after incidents MITRE ATT&CK should be used proactively for threat detection.

C . Rely solely on vendor-provided threat intelligence Custom rules tailored to an organization's threat landscape are more effective.

D . Deploy it as a replacement for current detection systems MITRE ATT&CK complements existing SIEM/EDR tools, not replaces them.

Additional Resources:

MITRE ATT&CK & Splunk

Using MITRE ATT&CK in SIEMs

Answer : A, B, C

Indexing issues can cause search performance problems, data loss, and delays in security event processing.

1. Use btool to Check Configurations (A)

Helps validate Splunk configurations related to indexing.

Example:

Check indexes.conf settings:

splunk btool indexes list --debug

2. Monitor Queues in the Monitoring Console (B)

Identifies indexing bottlenecks such as blocked queues, dropped events, or indexing lag.

Example:

Navigate to: Settings Monitoring Console Indexing Performance.

3. Review Internal Logs Such as splunkd.log (C)

The splunkd.log file contains indexing errors, disk failures, and queue overflows.

Example:

Use Splunk to search internal logs:

Incorrect Answer:

D . Enable distributed search in Splunk Web Distributed search improves scalability, but does not troubleshoot indexing problems.

Additional Resources:

Splunk Indexing Performance Guide

Using btool for Debugging

Answer : B

When a correlation search in Splunk Enterprise Security (ES) generates excessive notable events due to test accounts, the best approach is to filter out test accounts while keeping legitimate detections active.

1. Apply Filtering to Exclude Test Accounts (B)

Modifies the correlation search to exclude known test accounts.

Reduces false positives while keeping real threats visible.

Example:

Update the search to exclude test accounts:

index=auth_logs NOT user IN ('test_user1', 'test_user2')

Incorrect Answers:

A . Disable the correlation search for test accounts This removes visibility into all failed logins, including those that may indicate real threats.

C . Lower the search threshold for failed logins Would increase false positives, making it harder for SOC teams to focus on real attacks.

D . Suppress all notable events temporarily Suppression hides all alerts, potentially missing real security incidents.

Additional Resources:

Splunk ES: Managing Correlation Searches

Reducing False Positives in SIEM