Amazon Web Services Updated DOP-C02 Exam Questions and Answers by daniella

A comprehensive and detailed explanation is:

Option A is correct because removing the AdministratorAccess policy and assigning the ReadOnlyAccess managed IAM policy to the developer role is a valid way to prevent the developers from making any manual changes to the deployed resources. The AdministratorAccess policy grants full access to all AWS resources and actions, which is not necessary for the developers. The ReadOnlyAccess policy grants read-only access to most AWS resources and actions, which is sufficient for the developers to view the status of their stacks. Instructing the developers to use the CloudFormationDeployment role as a CloudFormation service role when they deploy new stacks is also a valid way to ensure that only CloudFormation can use the new role. A CloudFormation service role is an IAM role that allows CloudFormation to make calls to resources in a stack on behalf of the user1. The user can specify a service role when they create or update a stack, and CloudFormation will use that role’s credentials for all operations that are performed on that stack1.

Option B is incorrect because updating the trust of CloudFormationDeployment role to allow the developer IAM role to assume the CloudFormationDeployment role is not a valid solution. This would allow the developers to manually assume the CloudFormationDeployment role and perform actions on the deployed resources, which is not what the company wants. The trust of CloudFormationDeployment role should only allow the cloudformation.amazonaws.com AWS principal to assume the role, as in option D.

Option C is incorrect because configuring the IAM user to be able to get and pass the CloudFormationDeployment role if cloudformation actions for resources is not a valid solution. This would allow the developers to manually pass the CloudFormationDeployment role to other services or resources, which is not what the company wants. The IAM user should only be able to pass the CloudFormationDeployment role as a service role when they create or update a stack with CloudFormation, as in option A.

Option D is correct because updating the trust of CloudFormationDeployment role to allow the cloudformation.amazonaws.com AWS principal to perform the iam:AssumeRole action is a valid solution. This allows CloudFormation to assume the CloudFormationDeployment role and access resources in other services on behalf of the user2. The trust policy of an IAM role defines which entities can assume the role2. By specifying cloudformation.amazonaws.com as the principal, you grant permission only to CloudFormation to assume this role.

Option E is incorrect because instructing the developers to assume the CloudFormationDeployment role when they deploy new stacks is not a valid solution. This would allow the developers to manually assume the CloudFormationDeployment role and perform actions on the deployed resources, which is not what the company wants. The developers should only use the CloudFormationDeployment role as a service role when they deploy new stacks with CloudFormation, as in option A.

Option F is correct because adding an IAM policy to CloudFormationDeployment that allows cloudformation:* on all resources and adding a policy that allows the iam:PassRole action for ARN of CloudFormationDeployment if iam:PassedToService equals cloudformation.amazonaws.com are valid solutions. The first policy grants permission for CloudFormationDeployment to perform any action with any resource using cloudformation.amazonaws.com as a service principal3. The second policy grants permission for passing this role only if it is passed by cloudformation.amazonaws.com as a service principal4. This ensures that only CloudFormation can use this role.

Comprehensive & Detailed Explanation (150–250 words):

To allow developers to create IAM users without granting excessive permissions, the correct solution is to use permissions boundaries, which AWS specifically recommends for restricting delegated administrators such as developers. A permissions boundary defines the maximum permissions that an IAM user or role can delegate.

Step C ensures that each AWS account contains a PermissionBoundaries policy defining the maximum allowed permissions that any developer-created user may receive. This prevents privilege escalation, even if the developer attaches a more powerful policy. This aligns with AWS guidance for restricting privilege escalation within multi-account environments.

Step E ensures that developers can create IAM users but only if they attach the PermissionBoundaries policy as the permissions boundary. By attaching the DeveloperBoundary policy to the CreateAndManageUsers role, developers gain the ability to create users, but they are cryptographically prevented from assigning permissions outside the boundary policy.

Meanwhile, the DevOps team (who are not restricted by the boundary) can still create IAM users with full permissions.

This combination satisfies all constraints:

DevOps team: unrestricted IAM creation

Developers: restricted IAM creation enforced by boundaries

Other users: still blocked from IAM creation by existing SCP

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation From Exact Extract:

To add an automated test in AWS CodePipeline that checks the HTTP response code of a deployed application, the most straightforward and operationally efficient method is to create an AWS Lambda function that makes an HTTP request to the application URL, checks the response code, and then reports success or failure back to CodePipeline.

The Lambda function can be invoked as an action in the pipeline stage.

If the response code is not 200 OK, the Lambda function can return a failure, causing the pipeline stage to fail and halt further execution.

Option A’s CloudWatch synthetic canary monitors are useful for ongoing monitoring but are not natively integrated as CodePipeline actions to control pipeline flow.

Option C incorrectly uses CodeDeploy action for testing, which is not designed for this purpose.

Option D introduces unnecessary complexity by deploying API Gateway and Device Farm, which is not required for a simple HTTP status check.Therefore, option B provides a clean, simple, and fully automated way to enforce HTTP response validation within the pipeline.

Reference from AWS Official Documentation:

AWS CodePipeline Custom Actions:"You can create Lambda invoke actions in your pipeline stages to run custom validation or testing functions."(AWS CodePipeline User Guide - Lambda Actions)

AWS Lambda Function for Health Checks:"Lambda functions can be used to perform health checks or API response validations and report results back to invoking services."(AWS Lambda Developer Guide)