SnowPro Specialty: Gen AI Question 220
Single answerRestrict access to specific modelsA Snowflake administrator is enabling Cortex AI functions for multiple business units. The Legal team must be allowed to use only a small set of approved models for prompt-based workflows, while other teams can continue using a broader set of models. The administrator wants the restriction to be enforced centrally in Snowflake rather than in each application. Which action should the administrator take?
- A
Create a network policy for the Legal team's users so they can connect only when approved models are requested.
- B
Grant the Legal team's role access only to the specific Cortex models that have been approved, and do not grant access to other models.
- C
Use masking policies on prompt columns so users can query only the approved models.
- D
Create a separate virtual warehouse for the Legal team and configure the warehouse to allow only approved models.
Show answer and explanation
Correct answer: B
Explanation
The best practice is to use Snowflake's role-based access control to restrict access to specific Cortex models. This allows administrators to centrally manage which roles can use which models, aligning with least-privilege access principles and avoiding inconsistent enforcement in downstream applications. Network policies, masking policies, and warehouses are all useful Snowflake controls, but they address different concerns: connectivity, data protection, and compute management. For Snowflake Cortex, model access should be managed through grants on the approved models to the relevant roles, then assigned to the users or service roles used by that business unit.
- A. Incorrect.
Incorrect. Network policies control how users connect to Snowflake, such as allowed IP addresses and network locations. They do not govern which Cortex models a role can invoke. This is a plausible distractor because it sounds like a centralized security control, but it does not apply to model-level authorization.
- B. Correct.
Correct. In Snowflake, access to specific Cortex models can be controlled through role-based access control by granting a role permission to use particular models. This is the appropriate centralized mechanism when one team must be limited to an approved subset of models while others retain broader access.
- C. Incorrect.
Incorrect. Masking policies protect sensitive data in query results or columns, not access to AI models. Someone might choose this option because prompt data and model usage are related in AI workflows, but masking does not restrict which model a user can call.
- D. Incorrect.
Incorrect. Virtual warehouses provide compute resources for workloads, but they are not the control point for model allowlists. Assigning a separate warehouse may help with cost isolation or workload management, but it does not enforce access to specific Cortex models.