During the configuration of Conjur, what is a possible deployment scenario?
The Leader and Followers are deployed outside of a Kubernetes environment; Slandbys can run inside a Kubernetes environment.
The Conjur Leader cluster is deployed outside of a Kubernetes environment; Followers can run inside or outside the environment.
The Leader cluster is deployed outside a Kubernetes environment; Followers and Standbys can run inside or outside the environment.
The Conjur Leader cluster and Followers are deployed inside a Kubernetes environment.
Conjur is a secrets management solution that securely stores and manages secrets and credentials used by applications, DevOps tools, and other systems. Conjur can be deployed in different scenarios, depending on the needs and preferences of the organization. One of the possible deployment scenarios is to deploy the Leader cluster outside a Kubernetes environment, and the Followers and Standbys inside or outside the environment.
The Leader cluster is the primary node that handles all write operations and coordinates the replication of data to the Follower and Standby nodes. The Leader cluster consists of one active Leader node and one or more Standby nodes that can be promoted to Leader in case of a failure. The Leader cluster can be deployed outside a Kubernetes environment, such as on a virtual machine or a physical server, using Docker or other installation methods. This can provide more control and flexibility over the configuration and management of the Leader cluster, as well as better performance and security.
The Follower and Standby nodes are read-only replicas of the Leader node that can serve requests from clients and applications that need to retrieve secrets or perform other read-only operations. The Follower and Standby nodes can be deployed inside or outside a Kubernetes environment, depending on the use case and the availability requirements. For example, if the clients and applications are running inside a Kubernetes cluster, it may be convenient and efficient to deploy the Follower and Standby nodes inside the same cluster, using Helm charts or other methods. This can reduce the network latency and complexity, and leverage the Kubernetes features such as service discovery, load balancing, and health checks. Alternatively, if the clients and applications are running outside a Kubernetes cluster, or if there is a need to distribute the Follower and Standby nodes across different regions or availability zones, it may be preferable to deploy the Follower and Standby nodes outside the Kubernetes cluster, using Docker or other methods. This can provide more scalability and resiliency, and avoid the dependency on the Kubernetes cluster.
References = Conjur Deployment Scenarios; Conjur Cluster Installation; Conjur Kubernetes Integration
You are setting up the Secrets Provider for Kubernetes to support rotation with Push-to-File mode.
Which deployment option should be used?
Init container
Application container
Sidecar
Service Broker
 According to the CyberArk Sentry Secrets Manager documentation, the Secrets Provider for Kubernetes can be deployed as an init container or a sidecar in Push-to-File mode. In Push-to-File mode, the Secrets Provider pushes Conjur secrets to one or more secrets files in a shared volume in the same Pod as the application container. The application container can then consume the secrets files from the shared volume. The deployment option that should be used to support rotation with Push-to-File mode is the sidecar, because the sidecar can run continuously and check for updates to the secrets in Conjur. If changes are detected, the sidecar can update the secrets files in the shared volume. The init container, on the other hand, runs to completion and does not support rotation. The application container and the service broker are not valid deployment options for the Secrets Provider for Kubernetes in Push-to-File mode. References: 1: Secrets Provider - Init container/Sidecar - Push-to-File mode 2: Secrets Provider - init container/sidecar - Push-to-File mode
You want to allow retrieval of a secret with the CCP. The safe and the required secrets already exist.
Assuming the CCP is installed, arrange the steps in the correct sequence.
 The correct order of the steps is:
Explanation: To allow an application to retrieve a secret with the CCP, the following steps are required:
References:
When loading policy, you receive a 422 Response from Conjur with a message.
What could cause this issue?
malformed Policy file
incorrect Leader URL
misconfigured Load Balancer health check
incorrect Vault Conjur Synchronizer URL
The most likely cause for this issue is A. malformed Policy file. A 422 Response from Conjur indicates that the request was well-formed but was unable to be followed due to semantic errors. A common semantic error when loading policy is having a malformed Policy file, which means that the Policy file does not follow the correct syntax, structure, or logic of the Conjur Policy language. A malformed Policy file can result from typos, missing or extra characters, incorrect indentation, invalid references, or other mistakes that prevent Conjur from parsing and applying the Policy file. The message that accompanies the 422 Response will usually provide more details about the error and the location of the problem in the Policy file.
To resolve this issue, you should review the Policy file and check for any errors or inconsistencies. You can use a YAML validator or a text editor with syntax highlighting to help you identify and correct any syntax errors. You can also use the Conjur Policy Simulator to test and debug your Policy file before loading it to Conjur. The Conjur Policy Simulator is a web-based tool that allows you to upload your Policy file and see how it will affect the Conjur data model, without actually loading it to Conjur. You can also use the Conjur Policy Simulator to compare different versions of your Policy file and see the changes and conflicts between them. For more information, refer to the following resources:
In a 3-node auto-failover cluster, the Leader has been brought down for patching that lasts longer than the configured TTL. A Standby has been promoted.
Which steps are required to repair the cluster when the old Leader is brought back online?
On the new Leader, generate a Standby seed for the old Leader node and add it to the cluster member list.
Rebuild the old Leader as a new Standby and then re-enroll the node to the cluster.
Generate a Standby seed for the newly promoted Leader.
Stop and remove the container on the new Leader, then rebuild it as a new Standby.
Re-enroll the Standby to the cluster and re-base replication of the 3rd Standby back to the old Leader.
Generate standby seeds for the newly-promoted Leader and the 3rd Standby
Stop and remove the containers and then rebuild them as new Standbys.
On both new Standbys, re-enroll the node to the cluster.
On the new Leader, generate a Standby seed for the old Leader node and re-upload the auto-failover policy in “replace†mode.
Rebuild the old Leader as a new Standby, then re-enroll the node to the cluster.
The correct answer is A. On the new Leader, generate a Standby seed for the old Leader node and add it to the cluster member list. Rebuild the old Leader as a new Standby and then re-enroll the node to the cluster.
This is the recommended way to repair the cluster health after an auto-failover event, according to the CyberArk Sentry Secrets Manager documentation1. This method reuses the original Leader as a new Standby, without affecting the new Leader or the other Standby. The steps are as follows:
The other options are not correct, as they either involve unnecessary or harmful steps, such as rebuilding the new Leader or the other Standby, or re-uploading the auto-failover policy in replace mode, which may cause data loss or inconsistency.
A customer requires high availability in its AWS cloud infrastructure.
What is the minimally viable Conjur deployment architecture to achieve this?
one Follower in each AZ. load balancer for the region
two Followers in each region, load balanced for the region
two Followers in each AZ. load balanced for the region
two Followers in each region, load balanced across all regions
According to the CyberArk Sentry Secrets Manager documentation, Conjur is a secrets management solution that consists of a leader node and one or more follower nodes. The leader node is responsible for managing the secrets, policies, and audit records, while the follower nodes are read-only replicas that can serve secrets requests from applications. To achieve high availability in AWS cloud infrastructure, the minimally viable Conjur deployment architecture is to have one follower in each availability zone (AZ) and a load balancer for the region. This way, if one AZ fails, the applications can still access secrets from another AZ through the load balancer. Having two followers in each region, load balanced for the region, is not enough to ensure high availability, as a regional outage can affect both followers. Having two followers in each AZ, load balanced for the region, is more than necessary, as one follower per AZ can handle the secrets requests. Having two followers in each region, load balanced across all regions, is not feasible, as Conjur does not support cross-region replication. References: 1: Conjur Architecture 2: Deploying Conjur on AWS
Arrange the manual failover configuration steps in the correct sequence.
In the event of a Leader failure, you can perform a manual failover to promote one of the Standbys to be the new Leader. The manual failover process consists of the following steps:
References: The manual failover configuration steps are explained in detail in the Configure Manual Failover section of the CyberArk Conjur Enterprise documentation. The image in the question is taken from the same source.
How many Windows and Linux servers are required for a minimal Conjur deployment that integrates with an existing CyberArk PAM Vault environment, supports high availability, and is redundant across two geographically disparate regions?
5 Linux servers, 2 Windows servers
9 Linux servers, 2 Windows servers
3 Linux servers, 1 Windows server
10 Linux servers, 2 Windows server
This is the correct answer because a minimal Conjur deployment that integrates with an existing CyberArk PAM Vault environment, supports high availability, and is redundant across two geographically disparate regions requires the following servers:
Therefore, the total number of servers required for this deployment is 9 Linux servers and 2 Windows servers. This deployment architecture is based on the Conjur documentation1 and the Conjur training course2.
You are enabling synchronous replication on Conjur cluster.
What should you do?
Execute this command on the Leader:
docker exec
evoke replication sync that
*
Execute this command on each Standby:
docker exec
evoke replication sync that
*
In Conjur web UI, click the Tools icon in the top right corner of the main window.
Choose Conjur Cluster and click “Enable synchronous replication†in the entry for Leader.
In Conjur web UI, click the Tools icon in the top right corner of the main window.
Choose Conjur Cluster and click “Enable synchronous replication†in the entry for Standbys.
o enable synchronous replication on a Conjur cluster, you need to run the command evoke replication sync that on the Leader node of the cluster. This command will configure the Leader to wait for confirmation from all Standbys before committing any transaction to the database. This ensures that the data is consistent across all nodes and prevents data loss in case of a failover. However, this also increases the latency and reduces the throughput of the cluster, so it should be used with caution and only when required by the business or compliance needs.
References:
When installing the Vault Conjur Synchronizer, you see this error:
Forbidden
Logon Token is Empty – Cannot logon
Unauthorized
What must you ensure to remediate the issue?
This admin user must not be logged in to other sessions during the Vault Conjur Synchronizer installation process.
You specified the correct url for Conjur and it is listed as a SAN on that url’s certificate.
You correctly URI encoded the url in the installation script.
You ran powershell as Administrator and there is sufficient space on the server on which you are running the installation.
 = This error occurs when the Vault Conjur Synchronizer installation script tries to log in to the Vault using the admin user credentials, but the admin user is already logged in to other sessions. The Vault has a limit on the number of concurrent sessions per user, and the default value is one. Therefore, the installation script fails to authenticate the admin user and returns the error message: Forbidden Logon Token is Empty - Cannot logon Unauthorized. To remediate the issue, the admin user must log out of any other sessions before running the installation script, or increase the limit on the number of concurrent sessions per user in the Vault configuration file12. References: =
You are upgrading an HA Conjur cluster consisting of 1x Leader, 2x Standbys & 1x Follower. You stopped replication on the Standbys and Followers and took a backup of the Leader.
Arrange the steps to accomplish this in the correct sequence.
To upgrade an HA Conjur cluster, you need to follow these steps:
References: You can find more information about the upgrade process in the following resources:
A customer wants to minimize the Kubernetes application code developers must change to adopt Conjur for secrets access.
Which solutions can meet this requirement? (Choose two.)
CPM Push-to-File
Secrets Provider
authn-Azure
Secretless
Application Server Credential Provider
 Secrets Provider and Secretless are two solutions that can minimize the Kubernetes application code changes required to adopt Conjur for secrets access. Secrets Provider is a Kubernetes Job or Deployment that runs as an init container or application container alongside the application pod. It retrieves secrets from Conjur and writes them to one or more files in a shared, mounted volume. The application can then consume the secrets from the files without any code changes, as reading local files is a common and platform-agnostic method. Secretless is a sidecar proxy that runs as a separate container in the same pod as the application. It intercepts the application’s requests to protected resources, such as databases or web services, and injects the secrets from Conjur into the requests. The application does not need to handle any secrets in its code, as Secretless handles the authentication and authorization for it. References: CyberArk Secrets Provider for Kubernetes, Secretless Broker
When attempting to retrieve a credential managed by the Synchronizer, you receive this error:
What is the cause of the issue?
The Conjur Leader has lost upstream connectivity to the Vault Conjur Synchronizer.
The host does not have access to the credential.
The path to the credential was not properly encoded.
The Vault Conjur Synchronizer has crashed and needs to be restarted.
The cause of the issue is that the host does not have access to the credential. This can happen if the host does not have the correct permissions or if the credential is not properly configured in the Vault Conjur Synchronizer.
The Vault Conjur Synchronizer is a tool that enables the integration between CyberArk Vault and Conjur Secrets Manager Enterprise. The Synchronizer synchronizes secrets that are stored and managed in the CyberArk Vault with Conjur Enterprise, and allows them to be used via Conjur clients, APIs, and SDKs. The Synchronizer creates and updates Conjur policies and variables based on the Vault accounts and safes, and assigns permissions to Conjur hosts based on the Vault allowed machines.
To fix this issue, the host needs to have the permission to access the credential in Conjur. This can be done by adding the host to the allowed machines list of the Vault account that corresponds to the credential, and synchronizing the changes with Conjur. Alternatively, the host can be granted the permission to access the credential in Conjur by modifying the Conjur policy that corresponds to the Vault safe that contains the credential, and loading the policy to Conjur. However, this may cause conflicts or inconsistencies with the Synchronizer, and is not recommended.
For more information, see the CyberArk Vault Synchronizer docs1Â and the Synchronizer Troubleshooting guide2.
What is a possible Conjur node role change?
A Standby may be promoted to a Leader.
A Follower may be promoted to a Leader.
A Standby may be promoted to a Follower.
A Leader may be demoted to a Standby in the event of a failover.
According to the CyberArk Sentry Secrets Manager documentation, Conjur is a secrets management solution that consists of a leader node and one or more follower nodes. The leader node is responsible for managing the secrets, policies, and audit records, while the follower nodes are read-only replicas that can serve secrets requests from applications. Additionally, Conjur supports a standby node, which is a special type of follower node that can be promoted to a leader node in case of a leader failure. A standby node is synchronized with the leader node and can take over its role in a disaster recovery scenario. A possible Conjur node role change is when a standby node is promoted to a leader node, either manually or automatically, using the auto-failover feature. A follower node cannot be promoted to a leader node, as it does not have the same data and functionality as the leader node. A standby node cannot be promoted to a follower node, as it already has the same capabilities as a follower node, plus the ability to become a leader node. A leader node cannot be demoted to a standby node in the event of a failover, as it would lose its data and functionality and would not be able to resume its role as a leader node. References: 1: Conjur Architecture 2: Deploying Conjur on AWS 3: Auto-failover
You are setting up a Kubernetes integration with Conjur. With performance as the key deciding factor, namespace and service account will be used as identity characteristics.
Which authentication method should you choose?
JWT-based authentication
Certificate-based authentication
API key authentication
Connect (OIDC) authentication
According to the CyberArk Sentry Secrets Manager documentation, JWT-based authentication is the recommended method for authenticating Kubernetes pods with Conjur. JWT-based authentication uses JSON Web Tokens (JWTs) that are issued by the Kubernetes API server and signed by its private key. The JWTs contain the pod’s namespace and service account as identity characteristics, which are verified by Conjur against a policy that defines the allowed namespaces and service accounts. JWT-based authentication is fast, scalable, and secure, as it does not require any additional certificates, secrets, or sidecars to be deployed on the pods. JWT-based authentication also supports rotation and revocation of the Kubernetes API server’s private key, which enhances the security and resilience of the authentication process.
Certificate-based authentication is another method for authenticating Kubernetes pods with Conjur, but it is not the best option for performance. Certificate-based authentication uses X.509 certificates that are generated by a Conjur CA service and injected into the pods as Kubernetes secrets. The certificates contain the pod’s namespace and service account as identity characteristics, which are verified by Conjur against a policy that defines the allowed namespaces and service accounts. Certificate-based authentication is secure and reliable, but it requires more resources and steps to generate, inject, and manage the certificates and secrets. Certificate-based authentication also does not support rotation and revocation of the certificates, which may pose a security risk if the certificates are compromised or expired.
API key authentication and Connect (OIDC) authentication are not valid methods for authenticating Kubernetes pods with Conjur. API key authentication is used for authenticating hosts, users, and applications that have a Conjur identity and an API key. Connect (OIDC) authentication is used for authenticating users and applications that have an OpenID Connect identity and a token. These methods are not suitable for Kubernetes pods, as they do not use the pod’s namespace and service account as identity characteristics, and they require additional secrets or tokens to be stored and managed on the pods. References: = JWT Authenticator | CyberArk Docs; Certificate Authenticator | CyberArk Docs; API Key Authenticator | CyberArk Docs; Connect Authenticator | CyberArk Docs
TESTED 31 Oct 2024