HPE7-A02 Aruba Certified Network Security Professional Exam Questions and Answers

To set up HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) to enforce certificate-based authentication for clients using Tunneled EAP (TEAP), you need to select an EAP-TLS-type authentication method for TEAP's inner method. TEAP allows for a combination of certificate-based (EAP-TLS) and password-based (EAP-MSCHAPv2) authentication. By choosing EAP-TLS as the inner method, you ensure that the clients are authenticated using their certificates, thus enforcing certificate-based authentication within the TEAP framework.

For a faster way to discover if a gateway starts detecting threats in traffic, admins should set up email notifications using HPE Aruba Networking Central's global alert settings. This setup ensures that the security team is promptly informed via email whenever the IDS/IPS on the gateways detects any threats, allowing for immediate investigation and response.

1.Email Notifications: By configuring email notifications, admins can receive real-time alerts directly to their inbox, reducing the time to discover and react to security incidents.

2.Global Alert Settings: HPE Aruba Networking Central's global alert settings allow for customization of alerts based on specific security events and thresholds, providing flexibility in monitoring and response.

3.Proactive Monitoring: This proactive approach ensures that the security team is always aware of potential threats without the need to constantly check the Security Dashboard manually.

When using "Tips

" conditions within an 802.1X service's enforcement policy, you should enable caching roles and posture attributes from previous sessions in the service's enforcement settings. This ensures that ClearPass retains posture information from previous authentications, which is necessary for making decisions based on the current posture state of an endpoint. By caching these attributes, ClearPass can apply appropriate enforcement actions based on the device's posture status.

An HPE Aruba Networking AP's Device (TPM) certificate is signed by an HPE Aruba Networking Certificate Authority (CA) and is trusted by many HPE Aruba Networking solutions. This certificate is used for secure communications and device authentication within the Aruba network ecosystem.

1.CA-Signed Certificate: The Device (TPM) certificate is signed by a trusted Aruba CA, ensuring its authenticity and integrity.

2.Trust Across Solutions: Because it is signed by an Aruba CA, it is recognized and trusted by various Aruba solutions, facilitating secure interactions and communications.

3.Security: Using a CA-signed certificate enhances the security of the network by preventing unauthorized access and ensuring that communications are secure.

Zero Trust Security is a security model that operates on the principle that no entity, whether inside or outside the network, should be trusted by default. Instead, every access request is thoroughly verified before granting access to resources. This model emphasizes protecting resources rather than merely securing the network perimeter, acknowledging that threats can originate both inside and outside the network.

1.Resource Protection: Zero Trust focuses on securing individual resources, assuming that threats can bypass traditional perimeter defenses.

2.Verification: Every access request is authenticated and authorized regardless of the source, ensuring that only legitimate users can access sensitive resources.

3.Modern Security Approach: This model aligns with the evolving threat landscape where insider threats and advanced persistent threats are common.

When you have created a rule in a ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) service's enforcement policy to quarantine devices with endpoint conflicts, it is important to consider whether the company has devices that use PXE boot. PXE booting devices can create conflicts in the profiler because they may temporarily have different network attributes (e.g., MAC address or IP address) before fully booting and obtaining their final configuration. Understanding whether PXE boot is in use can help determine if profiler parameters need to be adjusted to ignore such temporary conflicts, ensuring that devices are not incorrectly quarantined.

To determine the VLAN settings for the "APs" role on AOS-CX switches, it is crucial to know whether the APs bridge or tunnel traffic on their SSIDs. If the APs are bridging traffic, the VLAN settings on the switch need to align with the VLANs used by the SSIDs. If the APs are tunneling traffic to a controller or gateway, the VLAN settings might differ as the traffic is encapsulated and forwarded through the tunnel. Understanding this aspect ensures that the VLAN configuration on the switches correctly supports the traffic forwarding method employed by the APs.

To ensure that HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) applies tag-based rules to a client immediately after learning the client has that tag, verify that both 802.1X services have the "Profile Endpoints" option enabled and an appropriate Change of Authorization (CoA) profile selected in the Profiler tab. This setup ensures that when a device is profiled and tagged, CPPM can immediately enforce the updated policies through CoA.

1.Profile Endpoints: Enabling this option ensures that endpoint profiling is active, allowing CPPM to gather and use device information dynamically.

2.CoA Profile: Selecting an appropriate CoA profile ensures that CPPM can push policy changes immediately to the network devices, applying the new rules without delay.

3.Real-Time Enforcement: This configuration allows for the immediate application of new tags and associated policies, ensuring compliance with security requirements.

Running periodic subnet scans on devices from HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) can be used to gather DHCP fingerprints, which help determine a client's device category and operating system. DHCP fingerprints are unique patterns in DHCP request packets that provide valuable information about the device type and OS, assisting in device profiling and policy enforcement.

1.DHCP Fingerprinting: This technique captures specific details from DHCP packets to identify the type and operating system of a device.

2.Device Profiling: By running subnet scans, CPPM can continuously update its device database with accurate profiles, ensuring that policies are applied correctly based on the device type.

3.Network Visibility: Regular scanning helps maintain up-to-date visibility of all devices on the network, improving security and management.

When configuring 802.1X authentication on edge ports of an AOS-CX switch and assigning VoIP phones to a "voice" role, the correct approach is to configure VLAN 12 as the allowed trunk VLAN in the "voice" role. This setup ensures that traffic tagged for VLAN 12 is appropriately managed by the role applied to the VoIP phones. In AOS-CX switches, the role-based VLAN configuration allows for more granular control and ensures that the VoIP phones' traffic is handled correctly without altering the edge port settings, which typically operate with default settings for authentication.

To minimize disruption time if an AOS-CX switch reboots while implementing DHCP snooping and ARP inspection, you should save the IP-to-MAC bindings to external storage. This ensures that the DHCP snooping and ARP inspection tables, which are crucial for preventing spoofing attacks, are preserved across reboots. When the switch restarts, it can reload these bindings from the external storage, thereby maintaining network security and reducing the downtime associated with rebuilding these tables.

1.Preserving Bindings: Saving IP-to-MAC bindings to external storage ensures that these critical security tables are not lost during a reboot, maintaining network integrity.

2.Security Continuity: This practice helps to quickly restore security features like DHCP snooping and ARP inspection, minimizing the window of vulnerability.

3.Operational Efficiency: By preserving these bindings, the switch can resume normal operations faster, reducing disruption to network services.

Gateway Threat Count Alert

This alert indicates that the gateway has detected threats in traffic passing through it. HPE Aruba Networking Central provides tools to investigate and analyze these threats in detail.

Analysis of Each Option

A. Use HPE Aruba Networking Central tools to run a Network Check on the gateway with which the alert is associated:

Incorrect:

Network Check tools in Central are primarily used for connectivity and performance diagnostics, not for analyzing detected threats.

This does not provide insight into the specific threats triggering the Gateway Threat Count alert.

B. Use Live Monitoring on the gateway to download a packet capture of recent traffic flowing through the gateway:

Incorrect:

Live Monitoring and packet capture can provide raw traffic data, but interpreting this requires significant manual analysis.

The Gateway Threat Count alert already provides summarized threat insights that are easier to access via the threat list.

C. Check the threat list for the gateway associated with the alert. Access threat details and download packet info:

Correct:

The threat list is specifically designed to display detailed information about detected threats, such as their type, severity, and source/destination.

Administrators can access this list in Central for the affected gateway, view granular details, and even download associated packet data for deeper inspection.

D. Check the gateway's Audit Trail in HPE Aruba Networking Central for more details about the threats that triggered the alert:

Incorrect:

The Audit Trail tracks configuration changes and administrative actions, not the details of detected threats.

It is not relevant for investigating the Gateway Threat Count alert.

Final Recommendation

To gather more information about what caused the Gateway Threat Count alert to trigger, check the threat list for the associated gateway. This provides detailed threat information and the option to download packet data for further analysis.

References

HPE Aruba Networking Central Threat Management Guide.

Understanding Gateway IDS/IPS Alerts in Aruba Central Documentation.

Best Practices for Threat Investigation Using Aruba Central.

To fix the issue where authorization fails because the usernames do not exist in the authentication source, you can configure rules in HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) to strip the domain name from the username. When certificates are issued by a Windows CA, the username in the certificate often includes the domain (e.g., user@domain.com). ClearPass might not be able to find this format in the authentication source. By stripping the domain name, you ensure that ClearPass searches for just the username (e.g., user) in the authentication source, allowing successful authentication.

OCSP (Online Certificate Status Protocol):

OCSP allows a device to check the revocation status of a specific certificate in real-time by querying the Certificate Authority (CA).

This is more efficient than downloading an entire Certificate Revocation List (CRL), as it only checks the status of one certificate.

Option Analysis:

Option A: Incorrect. Root certificates are still required to validate the CA issuing the certificate.

Option B: Correct. OCSP checks the status of a single certificate for revocation.

Option C: Incorrect. Downloading all serial numbers is a function of a CRL, not OCSP.

Option D: Incorrect. OCSP does not handle certificate renewal; it only checks for revocation.

To set up HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) for certificate-based authentication of 802.1X supplicants, you need to upload the root CA certificate as a Trusted CA with the EAP usage. This configuration allows the ClearPass server to validate the certificates presented by the supplicants during the 802.1X authentication process. By marking the certificate for EAP usage, ClearPass can properly authenticate the supplicant devices using the trusted certificate authority (CA) that issued their certificates.

To enable the detection of rogue APs with HPE Aruba Networking Wireless IDS/IPS (WIDS/WIPS) on AOS-10 APs managed in HPE Aruba Networking Central, each AP must have a Foundation with Security license. This license enables advanced security features, including rogue AP detection, which is crucial for maintaining a secure wireless environment and protecting against unauthorized access points.

The use case for the HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass OnGuard dissolvable agent is implementing a one-time compliance scan. The dissolvable agent is designed to perform a compliance check without requiring a permanent installation on the client device. This is ideal for environments where a quick, temporary assessment of the device's security posture is needed without the overhead of a persistent agent.

1.Dissolvable Agent: The dissolvable agent is downloaded and executed on the client device for a single session, performing the necessary compliance checks before being removed automatically.

2.One-time Compliance Scan: This method is particularly useful for guest or unmanaged devices where a temporary compliance scan is sufficient to ensure security standards are met.

3.Minimal Impact: Since the agent does not persist on the client device, it minimizes the impact on the user's system and does not require ongoing maintenance or updates.

For a company that lacks visibility into various types of user and IoT devices on its internal network, HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Device Insight (CPDI) is the recommended solution. CPDI provides comprehensive visibility and profiling of all devices connected to the network. It uses machine learning and AI to identify and classify devices, offering detailed insights into their behavior and characteristics. This enhanced visibility enables the security team to effectively monitor and manage network devices, improving overall network security and compliance.

In the exhibit, the HPE Aruba Networking Central settings for the 9x00 gateway show that traffic inspection is enabled, and the gateway is set to operate in IDS (Intrusion Detection System) mode with the fail strategy set to "Block". This configuration means that the gateway will drop traffic if it matches a rule in the active ruleset.

1.Active Ruleset: The ruleset version 9861 is active, and the gateway is configured to automatically update the ruleset daily.

2.Traffic Matching Rules: When traffic matches a rule in the active ruleset, it is flagged as suspicious or malicious.

3.Block Mode: Since the fail strategy is set to "Block", any traffic that matches a rule in the active ruleset will be dropped to prevent potential threats.

To control which commands managers are allowed to execute on AOS-CX switches using ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) as a TACACS+ server, you must configure the Shell service in the TACACS+ enforcement profile. The Shell service provides the ability to define granular access controls for commands. It supports policy-driven command authorization, which is essential in controlling administrative tasks based on roles.

References

Official HPE Aruba ClearPass documentation on TACACS+ integration and command authorization.

Industry best practices for AAA (Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting) configuration in network security architectures.

In a client-to-site VPN based on tunnel-mode IPsec, the remote clients and a gateway at the main site are responsible for the IPsec encapsulation. The remote clients initiate the VPN connection and encapsulate their traffic in IPsec, which is then decapsulated by the gateway at the main site.

1.IPsec Encapsulation: The remote clients encapsulate their traffic using IPsec protocols before sending it over the internet to the main site.

2.Gateway Role: The gateway at the main site receives the encapsulated traffic, decapsulates it, and forwards it to the internal network. Similarly, traffic from the main site to the remote clients is encapsulated by the gateway and decapsulated by the clients.

3.Security: This setup ensures that data is securely transmitted between the remote clients and the main site, protecting it from eavesdropping and tampering.

Why a Mirror Session Is the Correct Choice

To analyze a wired client’s traffic with Wireshark, you need the traffic mirrored to your management station where Wireshark is installed. The most effective way to achieve this is by configuring a mirror session on the AOS-CX switch, specifying the client port as the source and your management station as the destination.

Analysis of Each Option

A. Access the client's switch's CLI from your management station. Access the switch shell and run a TCP dump on the client port:

Incorrect:

AOS-CX switches do not natively support packet capture (e.g., tcpdump) directly on the switch CLI.

This approach is not feasible for capturing and analyzing live client traffic.

B. Go to the client's switch in HPE Aruba Networking Central. Use the "Security" page to run a packet capture:

Incorrect:

HPE Aruba Networking Central provides security insights but does not directly support initiating packet captures for detailed analysis.

Traffic analysis with tools like Wireshark requires local packet capture at the management station.

C. Set up a policy that implements a captive portal redirect to your management station. Apply that policy to the client's port:

Incorrect:

Captive portals are designed for user authentication and redirection, not traffic analysis.

This would disrupt the client’s network activity without enabling traffic analysis in Wireshark.

D. Set up a mirror session on the client's switch; set the client port as the source and your station IP address as the tunnel destination:

Correct:

Mirroring the client port to your management station is the standard method for analyzing live network traffic with Wireshark.

Steps include:

Configure a mirror session on the client’s AOS-CX switch.

Set the client’s port as the source.

Set your management station as the destination using its IP address (via GRE tunnel or physical interface).

Start capturing traffic with Wireshark on the management station.

Final Recommendation

To analyze the client's traffic, configure a mirror session on the switch, set the client port as the source, and direct the traffic to your management station where Wireshark is running.

References

AOS-CX Switch Port Mirroring Configuration Guide.

HPE Aruba Networking Central Monitoring and Troubleshooting Best Practices.

Wireshark Traffic Analysis and Capture Techniques.

Custom Device Fingerprinting on CPPM:

To create a custom fingerprint, you first need to connect a known device of that type to the network.

CPPM will discover the device in its Endpoints Repository, allowing you to analyze its attributes (e.g., MAC OUI, DHCP options) and create custom profiling rules.

Option Analysis:

Option A: Correct. Discovering a known device in the Endpoints Repository is a prerequisite for creating accurate custom fingerprint rules.

Option B: Incorrect. CPDI integration is not required for custom fingerprints on CPPM.

Option C: Incorrect. XML rules are not pre-defined; they are created dynamically based on observed attributes.

Option D: Incorrect. The "Automatically download Endpoint Profiler Fingerprints" setting is unrelated to custom profiling.

After installing an HPE Aruba Networking Network Analytic Engine (NAE) script on an AOS-CX switch, the additional step required to start the monitoring is to create an agent from the script. The agent is responsible for executing the script and collecting the monitoring data as defined by the script parameters.

1.Script Installation: Installing the script provides the logic and parameters for monitoring.

2.Agent Creation: Creating an agent from the script activates the monitoring process, allowing the NAE to begin tracking the specified function.

3.Operational Step: This step ensures that the monitoring logic is applied and the data collection starts as per the script’s configuration.

ClearPass Device Insight Integration:

To integrate ClearPass Device Insight (CPDI) with ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM), you must enable the Insight feature in the CPPM server configuration settings.

This ensures CPPM can share and receive profiling data with CPDI for device identification.

Option Analysis:

Option A: Incorrect. Root CA certificates are not required for this integration.

Option B: Correct. Enabling Insight on CPPM is essential for the integration to function.

Option C: Incorrect. WMI, SSH, and SNMP are not part of the CPDI integration prerequisites.

Option D: Incorrect. The Data Collector token is relevant to Aruba Central, not CPDI integration.

To tunnel VoIP phone traffic from AOS-CX switches to an HPE Aruba Networking gateway, you need to configure a User-Based Tunneling (UBT) reserved VLAN on the switches. This VLAN is dedicated for tunneling purposes and ensures that the VoIP traffic is correctly identified and tunneled to the gateway where security policies can be applied.

1.UBT Configuration: Setting a UBT reserved VLAN ensures that the switch knows which VLAN to use for tunneling traffic to the gateway.

2.Traffic Tunneling: The reserved VLAN helps in segregating the VoIP traffic, ensuring it is handled securely and according to the configured policies at the gateway.

3.Policy Application: By tunneling the traffic, the gateway can apply advanced security policies to the VoIP traffic.

The preferred method for assigning clients to a role on the AOS firewall is to configure HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) to assign the role using a RADIUS enforcement profile with an Aruba-User-Role VSA (Vendor-Specific Attribute). This method allows ClearPass to dynamically assign the appropriate user roles to clients during the authentication process, ensuring that role-based access policies are consistently enforced across the network.

Comprehensive Detailed Explanation

Traffic Match Evaluation Order:

The rules are processed in sequential order, and the first rule that matches is applied.

The added rule only denies SSH traffic to 10.1.4.0/23. Since 10.1.11.42 is not within the 10.1.4.0/23 subnet, this rule does not apply.

Next Matching Rule:

Rule 2 permits traffic to the 10.1.6.0/23 network, but this does not include 10.1.11.42.

Rule 3 denies traffic to the broader 10.1.0.0/16 network and logs it. Since 10.1.11.42 falls under this range, this rule applies, and the traffic would be logged and dropped.

Logging and Denylist Actions:

The denylist action in the new rule only applies to SSH traffic to 10.1.4.0/23. Since the destination is outside that range, the denylist is not triggered.

References

Aruba AOS-10 Role and Firewall Rules Documentation.

HPE Aruba Central Configuration Best Practices Guide.

Tag Updates Action - "Apply for All Tag Updates":

This setting ensures that all updated tags from Device Insight (CPDI) are applied dynamically.

It is particularly useful when you want to trigger Change of Authorization (CoA) without explicitly predefining the tag values.

Option D: Correct. This setting allows CPPM to issue CoAs automatically for updated tags without requiring prior configuration of specific tags.

Option A: Incorrect. The setting is not directly related to reducing the poll interval latency.

Option B: Incorrect. Disconnecting devices based on dangerous tags would require predefined enforcement rules.

Option C: Incorrect. Posture information updates do not directly rely on this setting.

802.1X Service Rules:

Service rules define the criteria for when a specific service applies (e.g., wireless vs. wired authentication).

For wired 802.1X authentication to work properly, the service rules need to differentiate between wireless and wired connections.

If you copy the wireless service, the rules likely still match wireless-specific criteria. These must be updated to include wired-specific conditions (e.g., NAS IP or port types).

Option Analysis:

Option A (Role mapping policy): Role mapping policies determine user roles based on attributes but are not critical for differentiating wired vs. wireless.

Option B (Authentication methods): Authentication methods (e.g., EAP) remain the same for both wireless and wired 802.1X.

Option C (Authentication source): Authentication sources (like AD or internal database) do not need to change.

Option D (Service rules): Correct. Updating the service rules ensures the new 802.1X service applies specifically to wired connections.

ClearPass Role Mapping Policy:

The Endpoint namespace is used to reference attributes and tags related to endpoint devices.

Device Insight Tags are part of endpoint profiling information and are stored in the Endpoint Repository.

Option Analysis:

Option A: Correct. The Endpoint namespace includes Device Insight Tags.

Option B: Incorrect. TIPS refers to system attributes and configuration data, not endpoint tags.

Option C: Incorrect. Device is not a valid namespace in this context.

Option D: Incorrect. Application relates to application-level attributes, not Device Insight Tags.

Applying a time range to a firewall rule on an AOS device fulfills the use case of enforcing the rule only during the specified time range. This allows administrators to control when specific firewall rules are active, which can be useful for implementing policies that only need to be in effect during certain hours, such as blocking or allowing access to specific resources outside of business hours.

1.Time-Based Enforcement: The firewall rule will be active only during the specified time range, ensuring that the rule's policies are enforced only when needed.

2.Use Case: This feature is useful for scenarios like limiting access to certain applications or websites during working hours, or enabling enhanced security measures during off-hours.

3.Flexibility: Provides flexibility in security policy management by allowing dynamic adjustment of rules based on time schedules.

In HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Device Insight (CPDI), the clusters shown in the exhibit represent groups of unclassified devices that CPDI's machine learning algorithms have identified as having similar attributes. These clusters are formed based on observed characteristics and behaviors of the devices, helping administrators to categorize and manage devices more effectively.

1.Machine Learning: CPDI uses machine learning to analyze device attributes and group them into clusters based on similarities.

2.Unclassified Devices: These clusters typically represent devices that have not yet been explicitly classified by admins but share common attributes that suggest they belong to the same category.

3.Management: This clustering helps in simplifying the process of managing and applying policies to groups of similar devices.

Rogue AP Containment Methods:

HPE Aruba Networking recommends using wireless deauthentication as the preferred method for rogue AP containment.

Deauthentication sends deauth frames to clients connected to rogue APs, causing them to disconnect. This method is effective without introducing unnecessary disruptions to the wired infrastructure.

Key Points:

Wireless Deauthentication is simple, efficient, and widely supported across client devices.

Tarpit Containment is more aggressive and may cause unintentional disruptions to legitimate clients.

Wired Containment involves blocking traffic at the switch level but is complex and may impact legitimate infrastructure traffic.

Option Analysis:

Option A: Correct. Wireless deauthentication is the recommended method as it targets rogue AP clients without excessive network impact.

Option B: Incorrect. Combining wireless tarpit and wired containment is overkill and not typically recommended.

Option C: Incorrect. Wireless tarpit can be effective but is generally not the first choice due to its aggressive nature.

Option D: Incorrect. Wired containment is more complex and reserved for specific use cases, not general recommendations.

To simplify the setup of 802.1X authentication with HPE Aruba Networking ClearPass Policy Manager (CPPM) and ensure clients are steered to the correct VLANs for local forwarding, you should assign consistent names to VLANs of the same type across the AOS-CX switches and have user-roles reference these names. This approach allows for a more straightforward configuration and management process, as the user roles can apply consistent policies based on VLAN names rather than specific IDs. It also helps in maintaining clarity and reducing errors in VLAN assignments across different switches.

Packet Capture in Aruba Central:

Aruba Central provides tools for remote packet captures directly from the APs.

On the "Security" page for the AP, you can initiate a packet capture session, specifying the client device and capture duration.

The traffic is captured into a PCAP file, which can be downloaded and analyzed using tools like Wireshark.

Option Analysis:

Option A: Incorrect. While possible via CLI, Aruba Central provides a simpler method for packet captures.

Option B: Correct. Aruba Central’s "Security" page allows you to capture and export client traffic efficiently.

Option C: Incorrect. The "Live Events" page focuses on monitoring events, not packet captures.

Option D: Incorrect. Port mirroring on the switch captures AP traffic but requires more manual configuration and does not isolate client-specific wireless traffic easily.