Every Azure AD directory comes with an initial domain name in the form of domainname.onmicrosoft.com. The initial domain name cannot be changed or deleted, but you can add your corporate domain name to Azure AD as well. For example, your organization probably has other domain names used to do business and users who sign in using your corporate domain name. Adding custom domain names to Azure AD allows you to assign user names in the directory that are familiar to your users, such as ‘alice@contoso.com.’ instead of 'alice@domain name.onmicrosoft.com'.

Scenario:

Network Infrastructure: Each office has a local data center that contains all the servers for that office. Each office has a dedicated connection to the Internet.

Humongous Insurance has a single-domain Active Directory forest named humongousinsurance.com

Planned Azure AD Infrastructure: The on-premises Active Directory domain will be synchronized to Azure AD.

References: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/fundamentals/add-custom-domain

Scenario: Licensing Issue

1. You attempt to assign a license in Azure to several users and receive the following error message: "Licenses not assigned. License agreement failed for one user."

2. You verify that the Azure subscription has the available licenses.

Solution:

License cannot be assigned to a user without a usage location specified.

Some Microsoft services aren't available in all locations because of local laws and regulations. Before you can assign a license to a user, you must specify the Usage location property for the user. You can specify the location under the User > Profile > Settings section in the Azure portal.

Cost analysis: Correct Option

In cost analysis blade of Azure, you can see all the detail for custom time span. You can use this to determine expenditure of last few day, weeks, and month. Below options are available in Cost analysis blade for filtering information by time span:  last 7 days, last 30 days, and custom date range. Choosing the first option (last 7 days) auditors can view the costs by time span.

Cost analysis shows data for the current month by default. Use the date selector to switch to common date ranges quickly. Examples include the last seven days, the last month, the current year, or a custom date range. Pay-as-you-go subscriptions also include date ranges based on your billing period, which isn't bound to the calendar month, like the current billing period or last invoice. Use the <PREVIOUS and NEXT> links at the top of the menu to jump to the previous or next period, respectively. For example, <PREVIOUS will switch from the Last 7 days to 8-14 days ago or 15-21 days ago.

Invoice: Incorrect Option

Invoices can only be used for past billing periods not for current billing period, i.e. if your requirement is to know the last week's cost then that also not filled by invoices because Azure  generates invoice at the end of the month. Even though Invoices have custom timespan, but when you put in dates for a week, the pane would be empty. Below is from Microsoft document:

Resource Provider: Incorrect Option

When deploying resources, you frequently need to retrieve information about the resource providers and types. For example, if you want to store keys and secrets, you work with the Microsoft.KeyVault resource provider. This resource provider offers a resource type called vaults for creating the key vault. This is not useful for reviewing all Azure costs from the past week which is required for audit.

Payment method: Incorrect Option

Payment methods is not useful for reviewing all Azure costs from the past week which is required for audit.

Change the Service administrator for an Azure subscription

Sign in to Account Center as the Account administrator.

Select a subscription.

On the right side, select Edit subscription details.

Scenario: Designate a new user named Admin1 as the service administrator of the Azure subscription.

References: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/billing/billing-add-change-azure-subscription-administrator

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/backup/backup-azure-files?tabs=backup-center

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/backup/backup-azure-vms-first-look-arm#back-up-from-azure-vm-settings

Statement 1: Yes

Contoso is moving the existing product blueprint files to Azure Blob storage which will ensure that the blueprint files are stored in the archive storage tier.

Use unmanaged standard storage for the hard disks of the virtual machines. We use Page Blobs for these.

Statement 2: No

Azure Table storage stores large amounts of structured data. The service is a NoSQL datastore which accepts authenticated calls from inside and outside the Azure cloud. Azure tables are ideal for storing structured, non-relational data. Common uses of Table storage include:

1. Storing TBs of structured data capable of serving web scale applications

2. Storing datasets that don't require complex joins, foreign keys, or stored procedures and can be denormalized for fast access

3. Quickly querying data using a clustered index

4. Accessing data using the OData protocol and LINQ queries with WCF Data Service .NET Libraries

Statement 3: No

File Storage can be used if your business use case needs to deal mostly with standard File extensions like *.docx, *.png and *.bak then you should probably go with this storage option.

Box 1: Selected

Only selected users should be able to join devices

Box 2: Yes

Require Multi-Factor Auth to join devices.

From scenario:

Ensure that only users who are part of a group named Pilot can join devices to Azure AD

Ensure that when users join devices to Azure Active Directory (Azure AD), the users use a mobile phone to verify their identity.

A Recovery Services vault is a logical container that stores the backup data for each protected resource, such as Azure VMs. When the backup job for a protected resource runs, it creates a recovery point inside the Recovery Services vault.

Scenario:

There are three application tiers, each with five virtual machines.

Move all the virtual machines for App1 to Azure.

Ensure that all the virtual machines for App1 are protected by backups.

References: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/backup/quick-backup-vm-portal

As App1 is public-facing we need an incoming security rule, related to the access of the web servers.

Scenario: You have a public-facing application named App1. App1 is comprised of the following three tiers: a SQL database, a web front end, and a processing middle tier.

Each tier is comprised of five virtual machines. Users access the web front end by using HTTPS only.

Azure Storage Explorer is a free tool from Microsoft that allows you to work with Azure Storage data on Windows, macOS, and Linux. You can use it to upload and download data from Azure blob storage.

Scenario:

Planned Changes include: move the existing product blueprint files to Azure Blob storage.

Technical Requirements include: Copy the blueprint files to Azure over the Internet.

References: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/machine-learning/team-data-science-process/move-data-to-azure-blob-using-azure-storage-explorer

This reference architecture shows how to deploy VMs and a virtual network configured for an N-tier application, using SQL Server on Windows for the data tier.

Scenario: You have a public-facing application named App1. App1 is comprised of the following three tiers:

A SQL database

A web front end

A processing middle tier

Each tier is comprised of five virtual machines. Users access the web front end by using HTTPS only.

Technical requirements include:

Move all the virtual machines for App1 to Azure.

Minimize the number of open ports between the App1 tiers.

References: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/reference-architectures/n-tier/n-tier-sql-server

Active Directory Federation Services is a feature and web service in the Windows Server Operating System that allows sharing of identity information outside a company’s network.

Scenario: Technical Requirements include:

Prevent user passwords or hashes of passwords from being stored in Azure.

References: https://www.sherweb.com/bl og/active-directory-federation-services/

Box 1: A Recovery Services vault

A Recovery Services vault is an entity that stores all the backups and recovery points you create over time.

Box 2: A backup policy

What happens when I change my backup policy?

When a new policy is applied, schedule and retention of the new policy is followed.

References:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/backup/backup-configure-vault

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/backup/backup-azure-backup-faq

A Recovery Services vault is a storage entity in Azure that houses data. The data is typically copies of data, or configuration information for virtual machines (VMs), workloads, servers, or workstations. You can use Recovery Services vaults to hold backup data for various Azure services such as IaaS VMs (Linux or Windows) and Azure SQL databases.

You can use backup policy to configure schedule.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/backup/backup-azure-recovery-services-vault-overviewhttps://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/backup/backup-azure-vms-first-look-arm

According to the Microsoft documentation, Azure Monitor collects and analyzes monitoring data from Azure resources, including Azure SQL databases. You can use Azure Monitor to monitor the performance of DB1 and run queries to analyze log data.

To use Azure Monitor, you need to configure the diagnostic settings of DB1, which define the sources and destinations of the monitoring data. The sources are the types of metric and log data to send to the destinations, such as SQLInsights, Errors, Blocks, Deadlocks, etc. The destinations are one or more locations where you want to send the monitoring data, such as a Log Analytics workspace, a storage account, or an event hub.

A Log Analytics workspace is a unique environment for Azure Monitor log data. Each workspace has its own data repository and configuration, and data sources and solutions are configured to store their data in a particular workspace. You can use a Log Analytics workspace to run queries on the log data collected from DB1 and other resources using the Kusto query language. You can also create alerts, dashboards, and workbooks based on the log data in the workspace.

A storage account is a place where you can store large amounts of unstructured data, such as files, blobs, queues, tables, and disks. You can use a storage account to archive the monitoring data from DB1 for long-term retention or backup purposes. However, you cannot run queries on the log data in a storage account directly. You would need to use another tool or service to analyze the log data in a storage account.

An event hub is a service that enables you to ingest and process large volumes of streaming data from multiple sources. You can use an event hub to stream the monitoring data from DB1 to other applications or services that can consume and analyze the data in real time. However, you cannot run queries on the log data in an event hub directly. You would need to use another tool or service to analyze the log data in an event hub.

The Traffic Manager Contributor role is not related to Traffic Analytics. Traffic Manager is a service that provides DNS-based load balancing and traffic routing across different regions and endpoints. Traffic Manager Contributor is a role that allows you to create and manage Traffic Manager profiles, endpoints, and geographies1.

Traffic Analytics is a service that provides visibility into user and application activity in your cloud networks. Traffic Analytics analyzes Azure Network Watcher network security group (NSG) flow logs to provide insights into traffic flow in your Azure cloud. With Traffic Analytics, you can visualize network activity, identify hot spots, secure your network, optimize your network deployment, and pinpoint network misconfigurations2.

To enable Traffic Analytics for an Azure subscription, you need to have a role that grants you the following permissions at the subscription level:

Microsoft.Network/applicationGateways/read

Microsoft.Network/connections/read

Microsoft.Network/loadBalancers/read

Microsoft.Network/localNetworkGateways/read

Microsoft.Network/networkInterfaces/read

Microsoft.Network/networkSecurityGroups/read

Microsoft.Network/publicIPAddresses/read

Microsoft.Network/routeTables/read

Microsoft.Network/virtualNetworkGateways/read

Microsoft.Network/virtualNetworks/read

Microsoft.OperationalInsights/workspaces/*

Some of the built-in roles that have these permissions are Owner, Contributor, or Network Contributor3. However, these roles also grant other permissions that may not be necessary or desirable for enabling Traffic Analytics. Therefore, the best practice is to use the principle of least privilege and create a custom role that only has the required permissions for enabling Traffic Analytics4.

Therefore, to meet the goal of ensuring that an Azure AD user named Admin1 is assigned the required role to enable Traffic Analytics for an Azure subscription, you should create a custom role with the required permissions and assign it to Admin1 at the subscription level.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-monitor/alerts/alerts-create-new-alert-rule

You create an alert rule by combining:

- The resources to be monitored.

- The signal or telemetry from the resource.

- Conditions.

Then you define these elements for the resulting alert actions by using:

- Alert processing rules

- Action groups

Ensure port 445 is open: The SMB protocol requires TCP port 445 to be open; connections will fail if port 445 is blocked.

References: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/files/storage-how-to-use-files-windows

Box 1: storageaccount1 and storageaccount2 only

Box 2: All the storage accounts

Note: The three different storage account options are: General-purpose v2 (GPv2) accounts, General-purpose v1 (GPv1) accounts, and Blob storage accounts.

General-purpose v2 (GPv2) accounts are storage accounts that support all of the latest features for blobs, files, queues, and tables.

Blob storage accounts support all the same block blob features as GPv2, but are limited to supporting only block blobs.

General-purpose v1 (GPv1) accounts provide access to all Azure Storage services, but may not have the latest features or the lowest per gigabyte pricing.

References: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/common/storage-account-options

Box 1: Yes

You can specify DNS server IP addresses in the VNet settings. The setting is applied as the default DNS server(s) for all VMs in the VNet.

Box 2: No

You can set DNS servers per VM or cloud service to override the default network settings.

Box 3: Yes

You can set DNS servers per VM or cloud service to override the default network settings.

Placement Groups is a capability to achieve co-location of your Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) resources and low network latency among them, for improved application performance.

Azure proximity placement groups represent a new logical grouping capability for your Azure Virtual Machines, which in turn is used as a deployment constraint when selecting where to place your virtual machines. In fact, when you assign your virtual machines to a proximity placement group, the virtual machines are placed in the same data center, resulting in lower and deterministic latency for your applications.

The VMSS should share the same region, even it should be the same zone as proximity groups are located in the same data center. Accordingly, it should be proximity 2 only.

1. Tenant Root Group, ManagementGroup1, Subscription1 and RG1

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/1086208/assign-policy-to-specific-resource-in-azure

2. ManagementGroup1, Subscription1, RG1, and VM1

Traffic Analytics analyzes the network security group (NSG) flow logs to provide insights into traffic flow in your Azure cloud1. NSG flow logs are a feature of Network Watcher that allows you to view information about ingress and egress IP traffic through an NSG2. To use Traffic Analytics, you need to enable NSG flow logs for the network security groups you want to monitor1.

Diagnostic settings for VM1 or NSG1 are not required for Traffic Analytics. Diagnostic settings are used to stream log data from an Azure resource to different destinations such as Log Analytics workspace, Event Hubs, or Storage account3. Insights for VM1 are also not required for Traffic Analytics. Insights are a feature of Azure Monitor that provide analysis of the performance and health of an Azure resource4.

Technically, The finance department needs to migrate their users from AD to AAD using AADC based on the finance OU, and need to enforce MFA use. This is conditional access policy. Employees also often get promotions and/or join other departments and when that occurs, the user's OU attribute will change when the admin puts the user in a new OU, and the dynamic group conditional access exception (OU= [Department Name Value]) will move the user to the appropriate dynamic group on next AADC delta sync.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/enterprise-users/groups-dynamic-membership

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/co nditional-access/overview

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/az ure/active-directory/authentication/howto-mfa-userstates

Box 1: Create a virtual network gateway and a local network gateway.

Azure VPN gateway. The VPN gateway service enables you to connect the VNet to the on-premises network through a VPN appliance. For more information, see Connect an on-premises network to a Microsoft Azure virtual network. The VPN gateway includes the following elements:

Virtual network gateway. A resource that provides a virtual VPN appliance for the VNet. It is responsible for routing traffic from the on-premises network to the VNet.

Local network gateway. An abstraction of the on-premises VPN appliance. Network traffic from the cloud application to the on-premises network is routed through this gateway.

Connection. The connection has properties that specify the connection type (IPSec) and the key shared with the on-premises VPN appliance to encrypt traffic.

Gateway subnet. The virtual network gateway is held in its own subnet, which is subject to various requirements, described in the Recommendations section below.

Box 2: Configure a site-to-site VPN connection

On premises create a site-to-site connection for the virtual network gateway and the local network gateway.

Scenario: Connect the New York office to VNet1 over the Internet by using an encrypted connection.

Box 1: Create a Recovery Services vault

Create a Recovery Services vault on the Azure Portal.

Box 2: Install the Azure Site Recovery Provider

Azure Site Recovery can be used to manage migration of on-premises machines to Azure.

Scenario: Migrate the virtual machines hosted on Server1 and Server2 to Azure.

Server2 has the Hyper-V host role.

References:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/site-recovery/migrate-tutorial-on-premises-azure

Scenario: Litware must meet technical requirements including:

Ensure that VM3 can establish outbound connections over TCP port 8080 to the applications servers in the Montreal office.

IP flow verify checks if a packet is allowed or denied to or from a virtual machine. The information consists of direction, protocol, local IP, remote IP, local port, and remote port. If the packet is denied by a security group, the name of the rule that denied the packet is returned. While any source or destination IP can be chosen, IP flow verify helps administrators quickly diagnose connectivity issues from or to the internet and from or to the on-premises environment.

References:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/network-watcher/network-watcher-ip-flow-verify-overview

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/role-based-access-control/tutorial-custom- role-powershell

Get-AzRoleDefinition -Name "Reader" | ConvertTo-Json

https://docs.micr osoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/az.resources/get-azroledefinition?view=azps-5.9.0

https://docs.microsoft.c om/en-us/azure/role-based-access-control/tutorial-custom-role-powershell

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/microsoft.powershell.utility/c onvertto-json?view=powershell-7.1

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-u s/powershell/module/azuread/get-azureaddirectoryrole?view=azureadps-2.0

Scenario: Create a workflow to send an email message when the settings of VM4 are modified.

You can start an automated logic app workflow when specific events happen in Azure resources or third-party resources. These resources can publish those events to an Azure event grid. In turn, the event grid pushes those events to subscribers that have queues, webhooks, or event hubs as endpoints. As a subscriber, your logic app can wait for those events from the event grid before running automated workflows to perform tasks - without you writing any code.

References:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/event-grid/monitor-virtual-machine-changes-event-grid-logic-app