AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate (SAA-C02) — Question 343

A company has an application that generates a large number of files, each approximately 5 MB in size. The files are stored in Amazon S3. Company policy requires the files to be stored for 4 years before they can be deleted. Immediate accessibility is always required as the files contain critical business data that is not easy to reproduce. The files are frequently accessed in the first 30 days of the object creation but are rarely accessed after the first 30 days.
Which storage solution is MOST cost-effective?

Answer options

• A. Create an S3 bucket lifecycle policy to move files from S3 Standard to S3 Glacier 30 days from object creation. Delete the files 4 years after object creation.
• B. Create an S3 bucket lifecycle policy to move files from S3 Standard to S3 One Zone-Infrequent Access (S3 One Zone-IA) 30 days from object creation. Delete the files 4 years after object creation.
• C. Create an S3 bucket lifecycle policy to move files from S3 Standard to S3 Standard-Infrequent Access (S3 Standard-IA) 30 days from object creation. Delete the files 4 years after object creation.
• D. Create an S3 bucket lifecycle policy to move files from S3 Standard to S3 Standard-Infrequent Access (S3 Standard-IA) 30 days from object creation. Move the files to S3 Glacier 4 years after object creation.

Correct answer: C

Explanation

S3 Standard-IA is the most suitable storage class because the files require immediate access, which rules out S3 Glacier (Option A), and they are critical and difficult to reproduce, ruling out the single-AZ resilience of S3 One Zone-IA (Option B). Option D is incorrect because the files must be deleted after 4 years, not archived to Glacier. Therefore, transitioning to S3 Standard-IA after 30 days and deleting the objects after 4 years represents the most compliant and cost-effective approach.