CompTIA Security+ SY0-701 study guide and study notes for learners preparing for the Security+ exam. This repository is organized for exam prep, quick revision, domain review, and cheat-sheet style lookup of key cybersecurity concepts.
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- CompTIA Security+ SY0-701 exam objectives
- Security+ study notes for all 5 exam domains
- Cybersecurity fundamentals and security controls
- Threat actors, vulnerabilities, attacks, and mitigations
- Security architecture, infrastructure, IAM, and hardening
- Security operations, monitoring, incident response, and investigation
- Governance, risk, compliance, vendor risk, audits, and awareness
- Quick-review notes for exam preparation and last-week revision
| Resource | Link |
|---|---|
| Official Security+ certification page | CompTIA Security+ |
| Official SY0-701 exam objectives PDF | CompTIA Security+ SY0-701 Exam Objectives |
| Schedule the exam | Pearson VUE CompTIA Testing |
| Buy exam voucher / training materials | CompTIA Store |
| Candidate agreement and exam policies | CompTIA Exam Policies |
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Exam code | SY0-701 |
| Question types | Multiple-choice and performance-based questions |
| Maximum questions | 90 |
| Exam length | 90 minutes |
| Recommended experience | 2 years of IT administration with a security focus, hands-on technical security experience, and broad security knowledge |
| Passing score | 750 on a 100-900 scale |
Always confirm current exam pricing, retirement dates, policies, and voucher rules on the official CompTIA and Pearson VUE pages before scheduling.
| Domain | Weight | Main Focus |
|---|---|---|
| 1.0 General Security Concepts | 12% | Security controls, CIA, AAA, zero trust, physical security, cryptography |
| 2.0 Threats, Vulnerabilities, and Mitigations | 22% | Threat actors, attack surfaces, vulnerabilities, malware, hardening |
| 3.0 Security Architecture | 18% | Enterprise architecture, cloud, infrastructure, resilience, data protection |
| 4.0 Security Operations | 28% | IAM, monitoring, vulnerability management, incident response, automation |
| 5.0 Security Program Management and Oversight | 20% | Governance, risk, compliance, audits, vendor risk, security awareness |
Use the section files for focused revision. The complete combined notes file is listed at the end for full-review reading.
| Notes | Focus |
|---|---|
Section 01: Introduction.md |
Security+ overview and exam orientation |
Section 02: Fundamentals of Security.md |
Security principles and foundational concepts |
Section 03: Threat Actors.md |
Threat actors, motivations, and behavior |
Section 04: Physical Security.md |
Physical security concepts and controls |
Section 05: Social Engineering.md |
Social engineering techniques and defenses |
Section 06: Malware.md |
Malware types, behavior, and mitigation concepts |
Section 07: Data Protection.md |
Data security, privacy, and protection controls |
Section 08: Cryptographic Solutions.md |
Cryptography concepts and applied security use cases |
Section 09: Risk Management.md |
Risk identification, treatment, registers, and prioritization |
Section 10: Third-party Vendor Risks.md |
Vendor due diligence, contracts, access, and supply-chain risk |
Section 11: Governance and Compliance.md |
Policies, standards, procedures, controls, and compliance evidence |
Section 12: Asset and Change Management.md |
Inventory, lifecycle, baselines, and controlled changes |
Section 13: Audits and Assessments.md |
Assessments, audit evidence, findings, and remediation tracking |
Section 14: Cyber Resilience and Redundancy.md |
Backups, RTO, RPO, failover, and continuity planning |
Section 15: Security Architecture.md |
Defense in depth, zero trust, segmentation, and secure design |
Section 16: Security Infrastructure.md |
Firewalls, EDR, SIEM, NAC, DLP, VPN, and monitoring platforms |
Section 17: Identity and Access Management (IAM) Solutions.md |
Authentication, authorization, lifecycle, MFA, and cloud IAM |
Section 18: Vulnerabilities and Attacks.md |
Weaknesses, attack surface, common attacks, and mitigations |
Section 19: Malicious Activity.md |
Indicators, suspicious behavior, log sources, and triage questions |
Section 20: Hardening.md |
Secure baselines for systems, networks, cloud, and applications |
Section 21: Security Techniques.md |
Preventive, detective, corrective, cryptographic, and operational controls |
Section 22: Vulnerability Management.md |
Scanning, validation, prioritization, remediation, and reporting |
Section 23: Alerting and Monitoring.md |
SIEM alert quality, log sources, tuning, and detection examples |
Section 24: Incident Response.md |
Preparation, analysis, containment, eradication, recovery, and lessons learned |
Section 25: Investigating an Incident.md |
Evidence collection, timelines, scope, and investigation reporting |
Section 26: Automation and Orchestration.md |
Repeatable workflows, SOAR concepts, enrichment, and response automation |
Section 27: Security Awareness.md |
Phishing, social engineering, reporting, and user security behavior |
Section 28: Conclusion.md |
Final review and practical study connections |
Complete CompTIA Security+ SY0-701 Study Notes.md |
Complete combined Security+ SY0-701 study notes |
- Download the official CompTIA SY0-701 exam objectives.
- Review the section files topic by topic.
- Use
Complete CompTIA Security+ SY0-701 Study Notes.mdfor full-review reading. - Create flashcards for definitions, acronyms, ports, controls, and attack types.
- Practice performance-based questions with legal and authorized lab material.
- Review weak domains using the exam-domain weights above.
- Schedule the exam through Pearson VUE when practice scores are consistent.
- Buy vouchers only from CompTIA or authorized sellers.
- Voucher pricing and availability can vary by country, currency, student status, employer program, and expiration date.
- Read voucher expiration rules before buying.
- Schedule, reschedule, or cancel through the official Pearson VUE / CompTIA testing flow.
- Avoid brain dumps and unauthorized exam-question sites. They can violate exam policy and damage real learning.
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Corrections and improvements are welcome. Keep contributions focused on clear explanations, accurate terminology, exam-objective alignment, and ethical study material.
These are personal study notes, not official CompTIA training material. Use them with the official exam objectives and authorized practice resources.