Free CCST-NETWORKING Practice Test Questions and Answers (2026)

On most Cisco switches, the port status LED provides a visual indication of the link's state and activity. A blinking green light specifically signifies that the port has a valid link (is "up") and is actively transmitting or receiving data frames. The blinking corresponds to the traffic activity. In contrast, a solid green light, as seen on ports 1, 2, and 3, indicates a link is established but currently idle with no data passing through.

A. Link is up with cable malfunctions. Cable malfunctions or link faults are typically indicated by an amber or an alternating green and amber light, not a blinking green light.
B. Link is up and not stable. An unstable or "flapping" link would likely cause the LED to cycle between off and on, rather than produce a steady, rhythmic blink indicating activity.
D. Link is up and there is no activity. This state is represented by a solid green LED, which is the status of ports 1, 2, and 3 in the scenario, not port 4.

1. Cisco Systems

Inc.

Catalyst 2960-X Switch Hardware Installation Guide

"Product Overview

" Port LEDs section.

The documentation states for the Port Status LED: "Blinking green: Activity. Port is sending or receiving data." and "Solid green: Link. No activity. Port is not sending or receiving data." This directly supports that a blinking green light means the link is up and active.

2. Cisco Networking Academy

CCST Networking (NETFND) v1.0 Courseware

Module 6: "Communicating Between Networks

" Section 6.1.3: "Switch LEDs."

The official course material for the CCST exam explains that a blinking green port LED indicates "The port is transmitting or receiving data

" which corresponds to an active link.

3. Cisco Systems

Inc.

Catalyst 9200 Series Switches Hardware Installation Guide

Chapter: "LEDs

" Table: "Port LEDs and Modes."

This guide for a modern switch series confirms the same standard behavior: For the Port Status LED

"Blinking green" means "Port is sending or receiving data." This shows consistency across Cisco product lines.

The question specifies that the switch is "not accessible from the network" and requires an "out-of-band" method for access. Out-of-band (OOB) management uses a dedicated channel separate from the primary network data path. The console port provides direct, physical access to the device's command-line interface via a console cable. This method does not depend on network (IP) connectivity, making it the standard procedure for initial configuration and for troubleshooting when network access is lost. The other options—SNMP, SSH, and Telnet—are in-band methods that require the device to be reachable over the network, which is not possible in this scenario.

A. SNMP is an in-band management protocol that requires IP network connectivity to monitor and manage devices, which is unavailable.
C. SSH is a secure in-band management protocol that requires IP network connectivity for remote access, which is unavailable.
D. Telnet is an in-band management protocol that requires IP network connectivity for remote access, which is unavailable.

1. Cisco Networking Academy. (2020). CCNA 200-301 Official Cert Guide, Volume 1. Cisco Press. In Chapter 4, "Fundamentals of LANs," the section "In-Band Versus Out-of-Band Management" states, "Out-of-band management means you are cabled directly to the device... The most common example of an OOB connection is a console cable from a PC to the console port of a router or switch."

2. Cisco. (2023). Catalyst 9200 Series Switches Getting Started Guide. In the "Connecting to the Console Port" section, it details the procedure for establishing a local management session: "You can connect the switch to a PC... using the USB console port or the RJ-45 console port... This connection is required to perform the initial configuration." This highlights its role when network access is not yet configured or is unavailable.

3. Forin, A., & Van Jacobson, V. (1989). Telnet Protocol Specification. IETF. RFC 854, Section "Introduction". This document defines Telnet as a protocol for remote terminal access over a network, confirming its dependency on network connectivity, making it an in-band method. SSH (RFC 4251) and SNMP (RFC 3411) are similarly defined as network-based protocols.

The notation /24 is Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR) format, where '24' represents the prefix length or the number of bits in the network portion of the address. An IPv4 address has 32 bits, so a /24 prefix means the first 24 bits (or the first three octets) are fixed as the network identifier. For the network 192.168.200.0/24, the network portion is 192.168.200. The remaining 8 bits (the last octet) are available for host addresses. This creates a range of valid addresses from 192.168.200.0 to 192.168.200.255. Only the address 192.168.200.13 falls within this range.

A. 192.168.199.13: This address is in the 192.168.199.0/24 network, as its third octet (199) does not match the required network portion (200).
C. 192.168.201.13: This address is in the 192.168.201.0/24 network, as its third octet (201) does not match the required network portion (200).
D. 192.168.1.13: This address is in the 192.168.1.0/24 network, as its third octet (1) does not match the required network portion (200).

1. Cisco Press. (2023). CCST Networking 100-150 Official Cert Guide. Cisco Press. Chapter 10, "IPv4 Addressing," Section "The Subnet Mask," explains that a /24 prefix length corresponds to a 255.255.255.0 subnet mask, which fixes the first three octets as the network ID.

2. Kurose, J. F., & Ross, K. W. (2021). Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach (8th ed.). Pearson. Chapter 4, Section 4.4.2, "IP Addressing," describes CIDR notation, stating that for an address a.b.c.d/x, the 'x' most significant bits constitute the network portion of the address. For /24, this means the a.b.c part is the network prefix.

3. IETF. (2006). RFC 4632: Classless Inter-domain Routing (CIDR): The Internet Address Assignment and Aggregation Plan. Section 3, "The CIDR Scheme," defines that an IP address prefix is represented by the notation

When creating an initial support ticket, the primary goal is to provide the support team with a clear and actionable understanding of the problem. A detailed description of the fault (the symptoms) is essential to define what is wrong. Equally important is describing the conditions under which the fault occurs (the context), as this helps in diagnosing the root cause and attempting to replicate the issue. These two pieces of information form the core of the problem statement, which is the necessary first step in any troubleshooting process.

B. Details about the computers connected to the network: This is too broad. Information about all computers is generally unnecessary and clutters the initial report, which should focus on the specific fault.
D. The actions taken to resolve the fault: While this information is very useful to prevent redundant work, it is secondary to first defining the problem itself through a clear description and its context.
E. The description of the top-down fault-finding procedure: This describes a troubleshooting methodology, not specific information about the actual problem being reported in the ticket. ---

1. Cisco Systems

Inc.

"Tips for Opening a Service Request". In its guidance for creating effective support tickets

Cisco explicitly requests a "detailed description of the problem

including the specific symptoms" and information about the context

such as "When did the problem start? What is the frequency of the problem (intermittent or constant)?". This directly supports providing a fault description and the conditions of its occurrence.

Source: Cisco.com

"Tips for Opening a Service Request

" Section: "Information to Have Ready."

2. Cornell University IT Support

"How to Report an IT Problem". University IT departments provide guidance on submitting effective support requests. Cornell's guide advises users to "Describe the problem in detail. What were you trying to do? What happened?" and to specify "When did the problem start?". This emphasizes the importance of describing the fault and the conditions.

Source: Cornell University IT

it.cornell.edu

"How to Report an IT Problem

" Section: "What to Include in Your Report."

3. Carnegie Mellon University

Software Engineering Institute

"A Manager's Guide to Creating a System Trouble-Reporting System

" CMU/SEI-90-TR-021

1991. This technical report on creating trouble-reporting systems outlines the essential fields for a report. Section 3.1

"Problem Report Form

" specifies the need for a "Description of Problem" and "How to Reproduce" the problem

which correspond directly to a detailed fault description and the conditions of occurrence.

Source: Page 10

Section 3.1

"Problem Report Form."

To retrieve the IPv4 addresses associated with a specific host name, the nslookup (Name Server Lookup) utility is the most direct and appropriate tool. It is specifically designed to query the Domain Name System (DNS) to obtain domain name or IP address mapping and other DNS records.

• ipconfig is used for viewing and managing local TCP/IP interface configurations.
• tracert is used to determine the path (route) taken to a destination.
• netstat displays active network connections and protocol statistics.

By providing the host name www.companypro.net as the argument to nslookup, the utility queries the configured DNS server and returns the associated A (IPv4) or AAAA (IPv6) records.

Microsoft Learn Documentation: "nslookup," Windows Server Command-Line Reference. This official vendor documentation identifies nslookup as the tool used to display information that you can use to diagnose Domain Name System (DNS) infrastructure.

Cisco Networking Academy: Introduction to Networks (CCNA v7.0), Section 15.4.1. "The nslookup command was created to allow a user to manually query the name servers to resolve a given host name."

Kurose, J. F., & Ross, K. W. (2021): Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach (8th Ed.). Pearson Education. Section 2.4.3 explains DNS records and the use of interactive tools like nslookup for querying A-type (Address) records for IPv4 resolution.

Peterson, L. L., & Davie, B. S. (2020): Computer Networks: A Systems Approach. Morgan Kaufmann. This academic text describes the resolution process where utilities query the DNS hierarchy to map hostnames to IP addresses

The URL https://www.companypro.net:7100/api identifies three key components for a Wireshark filter:

1. Protocol: HTTPS operates over the TCP transport layer. While http is an application-layer filter, the specific syntax requested in the first dropdown often refers to the transport protocol.
2. Field: The value 7100 represents a network port. In Wireshark syntax, tcp.port or simply port is used to filter traffic on a specific port number regardless of whether it is the source or destination.
3. Value: The specific port number defined in the URL is 7100. Filtering by the hostname (companypro.net) would require a different field (e.g., http.host or tls.handshake.extensions_server_name), which is not compatible with the port selection.

Wireshark Foundation: Wireshark User’s Guide, Section 6.4 "Building display filter expressions." [Link: https://www.wireshark.org/docs/wsug_html_chunked/ChWorkBuildDisplayFilterSection.html]

IEEE Xplore: "Network Traffic Analysis Using Wireshark," (Section III: Filter Expressions). [DOI: 10.1109/ICCMC.2019.8819664]

IETF RFC 9110: HTTP Semantics, Section 4.2.2 (Defining the 'https' URI scheme and port components). [Link: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc9110]

Stanford University CS144: Introduction to Computer Networking, Unit 2: Transport Layer (TCP and Port Multiplexing).

The ipconfig output shows that the Default Gateway is 192.168.0.1. In a networking context, the default gateway is the local router that provides a path to other networks. To verify connectivity to the router, you use the ping utility followed by the gateway's IP address. nslookup is used for DNS name resolution queries, netstat displays active network connections, and ftp is for file transfers. Since the goal is to test basic reachability to the hardware device (the router), sending an ICMP Echo Request via ping to its specific internal IP address is the standard diagnostic step.

Microsoft Learn (Networking): "ping" command documentation.

IEEE 802.3 Standard: Section on Network Layer connectivity and ICMP diagnostics.

Kurose, J. F., & Ross, K. W. (2021): Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach (8th ed.). Pearson. Chapter 5: The Network Layer (Control Plane) - ICMP.

Tanenbaum, A. S., & Wetherall, D. J. (2011): Computer Networks (5th ed.). Prentice Hall. Section 5.6.4: Internet Control Message Protocol.

Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) relies on distinct categories to verify identity:

• Possession (Something you have): A one-time password (OTP) sent via SMS or an app requires the user to physically possess the registered device.
• Inference/Inherence (Something you are): This refers to biometrics. While standard documentation uses the term Inherence, in the context of this specific exam interface, "Inference" is the designated category for biological traits like facial recognition.
• Knowledge (Something you know): Passwords and usernames are the most common examples of information that a user must memorize and recall to gain access.

Using multiple factors ensures that compromising one (like a password) is insufficient for unauthorized access.

NIST Special Publication 800-63B: Digital Identity Guidelines: Authentication and Lifecycle Management. Section 5.1.1 (Memorized Secrets), 5.1.3 (Out-of-Band Verifiers/Possession), and 5.2.3 (Biometrics/Inherence).

Microsoft Learn (Security): "How it works: Microsoft Entra multi-factor authentication." Defines factors as: Something you know, Something you have, Something you are.

ISO/IEC 29115:2013: Information technology — Security techniques — Entity authentication assurance framework. Clause 6.2 (Authentication Factors).

CISA (Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency): Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) Guide. Categorizes SMS/OTP as "Possession" and Biometrics as "Inherence."

DNS (Domain Name System): Acts as the "phonebook" of the internet. It resolves human-readable domain names (like companypro.net) into machine-readable IP addresses.

DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol): Automatically manages and assigns IP addresses and other network configuration parameters to devices on a network, including static "reservations" for specific servers.

ICMP (Internet Control Message Protocol): Used by network devices to send error messages and operational information. The ping utility specifically uses ICMP Echo Request and Echo Reply messages to test reachability.

IETF RFC 1034 / 1035 (DNS): Defines the Domain Name System's role in name-to-address resolution. (Section 2.1: The Domain Name Space).

IETF RFC 2131 (DHCP): Specifies the protocol for dynamic host configuration and the mechanism for allocating network addresses. (Section 1: Introduction).

IETF RFC 792 (ICMP): Defines the Internet Control Message Protocol and the "Echo" and "Echo Reply" messages used by the ping command. (Pages 14-15).

Cisco Networking Academy (Introduction to Networks): Section 10.2.2 "DNS" and 10.2.3 "DHCP," and Section 13.3.1 "ICMP Messages."

Stanford University CS144 (Introduction to Computer Networking): Course modules on the Network Layer (ICMP) and Application Layer (DNS/DHCP).

S1 to R1: Connections between dissimilar devices (Switch to Router) use Straight-through UTP.

R2 to R3 (Underground): The diagram shows a blue line labeled "Underground Conduit" connecting Building 5 to Building 1. Per industry standards for inter-building runs and electromagnetic interference (EMI) protection, Fiber Optic is required.

R1 to R2: Connections between similar devices (Router to Router) historically require a Crossover UTP cable to align transmit and receive pairs, as shown by the orange link in the rack diagram.

S3 to Server0: Connections from a Switch to an End Device (Server) use Straight-through UTP.

Cisco Systems, Inc. "Cisco Networking Academy: Introduction to Networks (v7.0) - Module 4: Physical Layer & Module 7: Ethernet Switching." Ethernet Cabling Standards and Media.

IEEE Standard 802.3-2022. "Section 3: Physical Layer specifications for 100BASE-T and 1000BASE-T." MDI vs. MDI-X Crossover requirements.

BICSI G1-17. "ICT Terminations and Interchanges." Inter-building fiber optic requirements for grounding and EMI prevention.

Kurose, J. F., & Ross, K. W. Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach (8th ed.). "Chapter 1.2: The Network Edge - Physical Media." Pearson.