ADA-C01 Question 549
Single answerDesign and implement disaster recovery and business continuity plansA global financial services company runs a business-critical Snowflake workload in AWS US_EAST_1. Regulatory requirements state that, if the primary region becomes unavailable, the company must be able to resume reporting and operational analytics in another AWS region within 1 hour, using current data and the same security model. The Snowflake administrator must design a disaster recovery solution that minimizes manual effort during failover and keeps user access controls aligned between regions. Which approach BEST meets these requirements?
- A
Configure database replication for the production databases to a secondary account in another AWS region, promote the replicated databases during a regional outage, and recreate users/roles manually in the recovery account as needed.
- B
Configure account replication and failover groups to replicate the required databases and account objects such as users, roles, and grants to a secondary account in another AWS region, and perform account failover when needed.
- C
Create database shares from the primary account to a secondary account in another AWS region, and query the shared databases directly from the secondary region during an outage.
- D
Schedule periodic UNLOAD operations from the primary region to cloud storage in another region, and reload the data into Snowflake in the recovery region when the primary region fails.
Show answer and explanation
Correct answer: B
Explanation
For Snowflake disaster recovery and business continuity planning, the recommended pattern for rapid recovery across regions is to use replication and failover capabilities rather than manual export/import processes. In this scenario, the requirements include: 1) another AWS region, 2) recovery within 1 hour, 3) current data, and 4) the same security model with minimal manual effort. Database replication alone is insufficient because it does not fully address account-level security objects without additional administration. Failover groups are specifically intended to replicate supported objects across accounts for business continuity, including databases and important account objects such as users, roles, and grants, making them the best fit. This aligns with Snowflake best practices for organization-level business continuity planning using account replication and failover/failback workflows. Candidates should distinguish between database replication for object/data protection and failover groups for broader account-level DR orchestration.
- A. Incorrect.
This is only a partial disaster recovery design. Cross-region database replication can protect database objects and data, but manually rebuilding users, roles, and grants in the recovery account increases failover effort and risk. The scenario specifically requires the same security model and minimal manual effort, so relying on manual recreation of account-level security objects is not the best solution.
- B. Correct.
This is the best answer. Snowflake failover groups support replication of a defined set of objects, including databases and many account objects needed for business continuity, such as users, roles, and grants, between accounts in supported regions/cloud platforms. Account replication with failover groups is designed for cross-region and cross-cloud disaster recovery scenarios and allows controlled failover to a secondary account. This directly aligns with the requirements for current data, recovery within 1 hour, and preservation of the security model with minimal manual intervention.
- C. Incorrect.
Database shares are not a disaster recovery mechanism for a regional outage affecting the primary account or region. Shares provide live access to objects from the provider account; if the primary region is unavailable, the shared data source is also unavailable. This option reflects a common misconception that sharing can replace replication for DR.
- D. Incorrect.
Exporting and reloading data is a much more manual and slower recovery process. It does not preserve Snowflake metadata, transactional state, or the full security model, and it is unlikely to meet a 1-hour recovery objective for business-critical workloads. This approach may be used for backup-related processes outside Snowflake, but it is not Snowflake's recommended DR design for rapid regional failover.