~/Certifications/CCSK-Exam_Review
Certificate of Cloud Security Knowledge (CCSK) v4 by Cloud Security Alliance
Introduction
A few months back I enrolled in the CCSKv4 certificate provided by Cloud Security Alliance. I got the entire self-study course and certificate voucher for a 40% discount over the regular 395 USD price (Due to CSA’s promotional offer).
To get started with the CCSK course, one can opt for self-study or CSA training based, which provides; Virtual Instructor-Led, In-Person, and Online Self-Paced
It took me around 50 days to cover all 14 domains from CSA Security Guidance v.4 and 10 days to cover CSA Cloud Controls Matrix and ENISA Recommendations(European Union Agency for Cybersecurity) study materials.
CCSK shares almost equal space with CCSP offered by ISC2. However, CCSK covers more domains than CCSP.
CCSP = CCSK + Expanded Governance Items + Traditional Security + Privacy
More CCSK vs CCSP details here
The Exam
The exam is an open book exam, you get two chances to attempt the exam! The main objective of the exam is to make the test taker fully aware of the tactical and analytical aspects of Cloud Security.
I have got a good mixture of questions from almost every section of the provided course. I found that Domains; [1]Cloud Computing Concepts and Architectures, [6]Management Plan and Business Continuity, [5]Information Governance, [8]Virtualization and Containers, [9]Incident Response, [10]Application Security, [11]Data Security and Encryption, and CCM were extensively covered more than the rest of the topics.
Duration: The exam duration is 90 minutes.
Pattern: The exam contains 60 multiple-choice questions.
Passing Criteria: You have to score 80% score.
The exam is mainly focused on the various domains covered in the ENISA, Cloud Control Matrix (CCM), and Security Guidance v4.0.
The latest CCM document version is CCMv4.0.3. However, I have found that my exam was based on the CCMv3.0.1. It’s better to go through both of the versions and keep them handy during the exam.
Exam Tip: Be quick since 90 minutes will not be enough if you waste too much time on a single question, and do make use of the ‘Mark for Review’ feature wisely!
Who should take this Certification
I believe anyone who is interested in or practicing Cloud Security should consider this as a foundational certificate that gives in-depth knowledge into Cloud Security.
Thank you for reading, hope this article will be helpful in your CCSK quest.
