AZ-305 Question 121
Single answerYou are the solutions architect for a company that runs a mission-critical line-of-business application on Azure SQL Database. The company requires point-in-time restore (PITR) coverage up to 35 days and must also retain monthly backups for 7 years to meet compliance requirements. What should you recommend to meet these requirements in the most cost-effective and operationally efficient manner?
- A
Configure the built-in automated backups with the default 7-day PITR retention and store backups in geo-redundant storage.
- B
Enable Azure SQL Database Long-term Retention (LTR) for monthly backups with a 7-year retention policy and configure the built-in automated backups for 35-day PITR.
- C
Use Azure Backup to back up the virtual machine hosting Azure SQL Database daily and store these backups in a Recovery Services Vault.
- D
Use Azure Site Recovery to replicate Azure SQL Database to a secondary region for near real-time failover and store monthly backups there for 7 years.
Show answer and explanation
Correct answer: B
Explanation
Azure SQL Database includes automated backups suitable for point-in-time restore (up to 35 days) and a Long-term Retention (LTR) feature that enables retention of full backups for compliance (up to 10 years or even longer). This separates short-term PITR needs from compliance-based monthly/yearly backups. Implementing LTR for compliance is a best practice recommended by Microsoft (refer to official Azure SQL Database documentation).
- A. Incorrect.
Incorrect. While built-in automated backups are a good start, the default retention only provides up to 7 days for point-in-time restores and does not meet the monthly 7-year backup requirement.
- B. Correct.
Correct. Azure SQL Database offers built-in automated backups for PITR (configurable up to 35 days). You can also enable Long-term Retention (LTR) to keep monthly backups in Azure for up to 10 years (or more) for compliance purposes. This approach is both cost-effective and operationally efficient.
- C. Incorrect.
Incorrect. Azure Backup is typically used for VM-level backups, and while you might protect data this way, it is not the recommended approach for a Platform as a Service (PaaS) product like Azure SQL Database. It introduces unnecessary complexity and cost.
- D. Incorrect.
Incorrect. Azure Site Recovery replicates workloads at the VM or physical server level for disaster recovery scenarios, not for long-term retention of SQL Database backups. It does not directly address the 7-year monthly backup requirement.