Which of the following are Samba security modes or levels? (Choose TWO correct answers.)

Brenda K.Apr 28, 2026

A and E are your answers here, ads and share. This is a quick win, bank it in under 30 seconds and move on. Samba has a small fixed list of security modes you need to have cold: user, share, server, domain, and ads. Share mode allows connections without a username, the client just needs to know the share name, and it was common in older mixed environments. The ads mode ties Samba into an Active Directory domain as a full member using Kerberos, which is the enterprise setup you will see tested heavily on 117-202. Data, ldap, and network are not Samba security modes, they are distractors designed to catch people who are guessing from related Linux concepts, so do not let them pull you in.

Nina C.May 10, 2026

Okay so I went back to the smb.conf man page on this one because I kept second-guessing myself. The security parameter in Samba controls how clients authenticate, and the modes that actually exist are things like user, domain, ads, and share, so when I looked at the list I was crossing off anything that sounded like a protocol or a data type rather than an authentication mode. Share is an older one where the client only needs a password for the specific share rather than a full user login, and ads is the Active Directory Services mode where Samba integrates into a Windows domain using Kerberos, so those two stood out to me as the real answers. Can I ask though, do you know if "share" mode is still expected to show up on the exam even though it got deprecated in newer versions of Samba? I want to make sure I am studying the right scope and not wasting time on things that got pulled from the objectives.

Hiroshi T.May 29, 2026

The smb.conf man page is your primary reference here, and it lists the valid values for the "security" parameter explicitly: user, share, server, domain, and ads. Options B, C, and D (data, ldap, network) simply do not appear in that list under any Samba version covered by the 117-202 blueprint, so you can eliminate them immediately. The "ads" mode is used when Samba acts as a member of an Active Directory domain, and "share" is the legacy mode where no username is required by the client before connecting to a share. I actually saw a very similar question on my sitting a few years back, and I remember second-guessing "share" because I knew it was deprecated in Samba 4 and felt like a trick, but the LPI objectives still include it because the blueprint covers the concept, not just current defaults, and trusting the official Samba documentation over my instinct saved me that point.

Dervla O.May 27, 2026

The word "levels" in the stem is doing you a favor because it signals configuration vocabulary, not protocol names, so B, C, and D should fall away fast since those are services Samba can integrate with, not security modes you set in smb.conf. Lock in A (ads) and E (share) and move on.

Grace U.May 16, 2026

Yes, ads and share are both valid Samba security modes, and if you remember that the full traditional list runs share, user, server, domain, and ads, it becomes easy to eliminate the distractors like data, ldap, and network, which simply do not belong to that group.