CompTIA Network+ (N10-009)

Learn how network communications enable two or more devices to share data across bounded media like Ethernet or fiber, or unbounded wireless. Understand endpoints, redistribution points, and basic topologies.

Understand the purpose of network standardization and how bodies like ISO, OSI, IETF, IEEE 802, ANSI, TIA, FCC, W3C, IEC, and ITU drive interoperability and common specs.

Compare the four-layer TCP/IP and seven-layer OSI models, and learn how application to physical layers govern IP addressing, routing, and reliable versus best-effort delivery.

Compare the osi seven-layer model with the tcp/ip four-layer stack and examine how layer mappings differ from application to network interface.

Explore encapsulation and decapsulation across the OSI model, tracing how application data gains layered PDUs and SDUs, then becomes frames and packets for transmission.

Explore physical and logical network topologies from star, bus, and ring to mesh and hybrid models, and examine north-south and east-west traffic flows in security contexts.

Explore core networking protocols and services and their port numbers, including http, https, ftp, ssh, dns, dhcp, smtp, imap, pop3, smb, and rdp.

Explore ip protocol numbers in the ip header to identify upper-layer protocols and learn traffic types—unicast, broadcast, multicast, and anycast—and their impact on firewall rules.

Explore RFC 1918 private addressing and NAT to conserve IPv4 by translating private IPs to a public address. Identify private ranges 10.0.0.0/8, 172.16.0.0/12, 192.168.0.0/16 as non-routable.

Explore the five IPv4 address classes (a through e), their ranges, and default subnet masks. Learn real-world uses, including class d multicast, class e experimental, loopback 127.0.0.0/8, and APIPA 169.254.0.0/16.

Explore the structure of IPv4 addresses, learn how subnet masks define network and host portions, and understand network IDs, broadcast addresses, and binary conversion.

Subnetting divides a network into smaller subnets to improve IP address utilization and isolate broadcast domains, starting with a default classful mask and borrowing host bits to create new networks.

Discover variable length subnet masking (VLSM) and CIDR notation to tailor subnets for 50, 30, and 10 hosts, boost IP efficiency, and prevent overlapping networks.

Explore how CIDR enables efficient IP addressing and scalable routing by summarizing routes, moving bits left to create larger blocks, and using slash notation to define network prefixes.

Implement ip addressing in Windows by configuring ipv4 and subnet masks. Troubleshoot with ipconfig and ping, resolve domain controller connectivity, and demonstrate IPv6 auto-configuration and DNS name resolution.

Examine how switches reduce collision domains, provide selective forwarding via MAC address tables, compare unmanaged and managed, layer 2 and layer 3, and touch on PoE and Ethernet frame basics.

Routers connect distant networks and route traffic using IP addresses, routing tables, and path selection, while NAT handles private addresses and broadcast isolation complements internet access.

Explore wireless appliances, including access points, range extenders, and bridges, and learn infrastructure and ad hoc deployments, SSIDs, and antenna types for scalable, mobile networks.

Explore firewalls and IPSs, including network and host firewalls, ACL rules and implicit deny, and how packet filtering, stateful and application-level inspection protect inbound and outbound traffic.

Balance traffic across multiple servers with a load balancer to boost performance. Describe forward and reverse proxies, including web application proxies and transparent proxies, and their caching and security roles.

Explore storage area networks, a high-speed fault-tolerant fabric using fiber channel for block-level storage, with redundancy, and note iSCSI and fc over ethernet variants, plus NAS vs SAN concepts.

Explore site-to-site and remote access vpn architectures, tunneling and encryption protocols such as IPSec and IKEv2, and QoS concepts like diff serve code point and 802.1p vlan tagging.

Explore the 802.11 standard for wireless LANs, compare A, B, G, N, AC, AX, and BE, and explain frequencies, speeds, MIMO, channels, and DFS for Wi-Fi design.

Explore the 802.3 ethernet standard, its evolution from coaxial to twisted pair and fiber, and milestones from 10 base T to 100G base SR.

Explore transceivers and connector types for cabling, including ethernet, fiber, and copper media. Learn plenum and non-plenum cabling, cat standards from cat5 to cat8, and RJ45, LC, and SC connectors.

Explore wireless communications, covering cellular generations from GSM and CDMA to LTE and 5G, plus Wi‑Fi, Bluetooth, infrared, and SIM versus ESN concepts.

Explore cloud concepts and service models—SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS—alongside the shared responsibility model, elasticity versus scalability, on-demand access, broad network access, and deployment in public, private, and hybrid clouds.

Compare vpc, vnet, and vcn as virtual networks across cloud providers, and show how subnets, IP addressing, and security groups enable secure cloud networking with gateways and peering.

Explore software-defined networking and SD-WAN, distinguishing the control plane from the data plane, using northbound RESTful APIs and southbound OpenFlow for an overlay network driven by policies.

Explore vxlan, a scalable extensible lan that overcomes vlan limits by encapsulating layer 2 in udp over a layer 3 overlay, using 24-bit vxlan id for data center multi-tenant networks.

Discover zero trust architecture as a mindset of never trust anything, always verify, and assume breach, with dynamic authentication, continuous monitoring, and just-in-time access.

Explore infrastructure as code and how programmatically provisioning infrastructure in the cloud enables repeatable, automated, and scalable DevOps workflows, with examples from Azure templates.

Master IPv6 addressing basics: 128-bit space, eight colon-hex blocks, and leading-zero elimination; identify global unicast, unique local, link-local, and loopback addresses, plus slaac and dhcpv6 concepts.

Explore static routing, manually configuring routers with IP route commands to reach distant networks, achieving full reachability via static routes and correct next-hop configuration.

Explore open shortest path first (ospf), an open standard internal gateway protocol that uses bandwidth-based cost, supports variable length subnet masks, multicast, fast convergence, load balancing, areas, and authentication.

Discover how EIGRP, a hybrid interior gateway routing protocol now an open standard, uses the diffusing update algorithm and feasible successors to deliver fast, reliable convergence.

Explore border gateway protocol (BGP), the exterior gateway protocol powering global internet routing as a path-vector with configurable attributes, and learn to manually configure neighbors and autonomous systems.

Discover how routers select routes by applying administrative distance, longest match prefix, and routing metrics (OSPF and EIGRP), ensuring the best path and aiding troubleshooting.

Explore address translation and port address translation (nat and pat) to conserve IPv4 space, using private ranges 10.x, 172.16–31, and 192.168, and verify with show ip nat translations.

Learn how first hop redundancy protocols create a single virtual IP to keep internet access seamless, using HSRP, VRRP, and GLBP with varied load balancing options.

Learn to create subinterfaces on a router, carving one physical interface into dot1q encapsulated vlans with separate ip networks.

Create and name VLANs on a switch, assign access ports to VLAN 10 and VLAN 20, configure VLAN interfaces as gateways, enable routing, and verify inter-VLAN communication.

Configure PC and switch interfaces with IP addresses, subnet masks, default gateways, and DNS, using DHCP or manual settings, while tuning duplex, speed, VLANs, and layer 2/3 roles.

Explore how spanning tree protocol prevents loops on switches, using rapid spanning tree protocol (802.1w) and per VLAN spanning tree, with Ether Channel to increase available bandwidth.

Define the maximum transmission unit (MTU) and how payload, headers, and fragmentation affect data delivery. Note ethernet defaults to 1,500 bytes, with jumbo frames up to 9,216 bytes.

Discover wireless frequencies and channels across 2.4 gigahertz, 5 gigahertz, and 6 gigahertz bands. Explore non overlapping channels, band steering, and 802.11h dynamic frequency and power adjustments, plus signal to noise ratio.

Explain how service set identifiers define your wifi network name, distinguish ssid from bssid and basic service set identifier, and cover hiding, random naming, and roaming for security.

Explore wireless network types, from ad hoc and point-to-point to infrastructure and mesh designs, and learn how access points, controllers, and roaming enable connectivity.

Explore wireless encryption through the CIA triad of confidentiality, integrity, and availability. Trace the shift from WEP to WPA, WPA2, and WPA3 with AES keys and personal versus enterprise use.

Explore wireless authentication methods, from open authentication to pre-shared keys, EAP, and MFA, and see how 802.1X secures wired and wireless networks.

Learn how guest networks provide internet access via separate infrastructure, ensure isolation from corporate resources, and use captive portals with open, password, voucher, or federated login options.

Explore how different Wi-Fi antennas: omnidirectional, directional, parabolic, Yagi, patch, hatch, and sector, shaping coverage and support site surveys and optimized signal range.

Explore how access points vary by form factor and role, from autonomous to lightweight, and wireless LAN controllers enable lightweight APs to bridge wireless and wired networks in infrastructure mode.

Explore physical network installations from the main distribution frame to intermediate distribution frames and wiring closets, including patch panels, fiber distribution panels, and rack organization.

Explore how to plan power for networks and data centers using ups and pdus, calculate power loads with practical tools, and apply green, sustainable approaches to voltage and electricity use.

Manage environmental factors like fire, humidity, and temperature to protect networking facilities, using quick detection, gas-based fire suppression, and published vendor ranges for safe deployment.

Explore common networking documentation, from physical diagrams to logical diagrams and OSI layer views, and compile asset inventories, IP address management, SLAs, and wireless heat maps for baselined performance.

Explore life cycle management with the PPDIOO framework—prepare, plan, design, implement, operate, and optimize a network, including end-of-life, end-of-support, decommissioning, and security considerations.

Understand how configuration and change management protect networks by maintaining production, baseline, and golden configurations, preventing drift, and enabling secure backups and automation.

Discover how SNMP uses an agent and MIB to report temperature and CPU utilization to an NMS, with traps and security-focused v3 enhancements.

Analyze how flow data identifies conversations between devices using IP addresses, ports, and protocols, and compare it with packet captures using Wireshark to inspect PCAPs.

Learn how baseline metrics guide network management by tracking CPU utilization, availability, reliability, memory, and security; build CloudWatch dashboards and alarms to monitor performance and incidents.

Master log aggregation by centralizing diverse logs from syslog to security logs, so you can analyze, secure, and alert in real time with Splunk.

Learn API integration and REST API calls that share information between devices and software, with examples from Google Maps and curl, plus securing communications with Cisco Identity Services Engine.

Learn how port mirroring duplicates switch traffic to a monitoring station to observe unicast communications. Use local or port mirroring, via a remote VLAN, and enable only when needed.

Learn how network monitoring solutions use discovery techniques, including ICMP and vendor-specific protocols, with ad hoc and scheduled scans, and explore categories like traffic analysis, performance, availability, and configuration management.

Master disaster recovery metrics such as recovery point objective (RPO) and recovery time objective (RTO), plus MTTR and MTBF, to plan DR strategies and cloud recovery timelines.

Compare cold, warm, and hot disaster recovery sites, detailing cost, readiness, and data synchronization implications for RTO in enterprise setups.

Explore high availability approaches for disaster recovery, comparing active-passive and active-active designs, load balancing, tabletop exercises, and validating RTO and RPO with cloud-enabled testing.

Understand how DHCP dynamically assigns IP address, subnet mask, default gateway, and DNS settings using scopes and the DORA process. Learn about exclusions, reservations, relay, and IPv6 SLAAC coexistence.

Explore how the domain name system enables name resolution from URLs to IP addresses using DNS records such as A, quad A, CNAME, MX, TXT, NS, and PTR.

Align all network clocks with ntp and precision time protocol, using atomic clocks, stratum levels, and a grand master clock. Secure time sources with nts, certificates, authentication, integrity, and encryption.

Explore how virtual private networks secure communications with client-to-site and site-to-site VPNs, including clientless browser-based options, split tunneling, and use cases like Office 365.

Explore secure remote access methods for network devices, from console connections and Telnet risks to VPN-wrapped sessions, web GUIs, REST APIs, and secure shell.

Learn how jump boxes, or bastion hosts, provide secure access to secure network resources, with azure bastion automating the jump box and enabling tls 443 access to private ip addresses.

Compare in-band management, where management and customer traffic share a path, with out-of-band management that uses separate paths to secure and audit network operations.

Explore data security concepts by examining data states—at rest, in transit, and in use—and how encryption protects states with full disk encryption and tools like openssl, HTTPS, and OpenPGP.

Explore digital certificates and digital signatures, and verify authenticity through certificate authorities and PKI. Learn x.509 formats and common file types like PEM, DER, PFX, and PKCS standards.

Explore how PKI builds a certificate lifecycle with root and subordinate CAs, standalone and enterprise options, and internal versus external CAs, enabling encryption, authentication, and digital signatures.

Understand identity and access management as a centralized process for provisioning, authenticating, and authorizing identities and services across resources throughout their life cycle, including privileged identity management under IAM.

Explore authentication factors and how knowledge, possession, and biometrics prove identity. See examples such as username and password, pin, smart cards, authenticator apps, biometrics, pattern recognition, puzzles, and geolocation-based access.

Examine single sign-on and identity federation, including OAuth, OpenID, SAML, and Kerberos, showing how a single credential enables access to multiple resources and strengthens security.

Explore ldap authentication, including connection establishment, binding with a dn and password, and server validation. Learn how optional search and session establishment enable centralized authentication.

Explore identity-first authentication, authorization, and accounting (AAA) and how RADIUS and TACACS Plus centralize these processes, including remote access scenarios and port considerations.

Explore TACACS Plus, an AAA service for centralized authentication, authorization, and accounting in network device administration, using encryption over TCP and open-source support across routers and switches.

Learn how geofencing uses geographical areas to restrict device or account access, and how time-based authentication, via totp codes from authenticator apps, strengthens 2fa security.

Apply the principle of least privilege to grant access only when necessary, reducing privilege escalation risk. Audit and enforce policies as networks grow to keep data secure.

Explore authorization and access control models, including discretionary, mandatory, role-based, rule-based, and attribute-based control, with Windows and cloud examples and the concepts of authentication and accounting.

Examine physical security as a defense in depth for digital ecosystems. Implement cameras, access badges, guards, secure access vestibules, and lighting to deter and detect breaches.

Explore deception technologies like honeypots, honey nets, honey files, and honey tokens. Learn how decoys lure attackers from the production network and reveal attack techniques to strengthen organizational security.

Identify, classify, control, and monitor risks while distinguishing vulnerabilities as specific weaknesses and threats as potential actors, including insiders, script kiddies, and advanced groups.

Explore the CIA triad—confidentiality, integrity, and availability—along with authenticity, non-repudiation, and accountability, and learn practical measures such as encryption, access control, hashing, and backups.

Explore regulatory compliance and audits, focusing on data locality, GDPR, PCI DSS, and how data residency affects security and payment processing.

Analyze the security implications of IoT and SCADA in operational technology, focusing on embedded systems, IPv6 addressing, high availability, and secure data transmission with https.

Explore how network segmentation replaces flat networks with VLANs and guest networks, improving security and efficiency through BYOD policies and unified management.

Learn wired and wireless network threats, including physical access, VLAN hopping, ARP poisoning, rogue devices and rogue access points including evil twin, and Bluetooth attacks like bluejacking and bluebugging.

Identify network attack indicators by examining traffic spikes, ddos patterns, dns tampering, domain spoofing and poisoning, rogue access points, deauthentication tricks, ssl/tls anomalies, credential replay, and suspicious 2fa prompts.

Explore social engineering and malware concepts, including phishing, spear phishing, whaling, dumpster diving, shoulder surfing, tailgating, and ransomware, and learn how wormable malware like EternalBlue enables widespread compromise.

Explore network security defenses with device hardening, port controls, default credentials, NAC and MAC filtering, key management, ACLs, content filtering, and DMZ architectures to reduce attack surface.

Learn to implement a systematic, repeatable troubleshooting methodology that identifies and isolates problems, tests theories, builds an action plan, implements solutions, escalates when needed, verifies results, and documents for knowledge.

Identify the problem by gathering information, isolating root causes from symptoms, using logs and change management data, asking open-ended questions, reproducing the issue, and addressing it step by step.

Establish and test troubleshooting theories using simple fixes, the OSI model, and divide-and-conquer to isolate issues and guide actionable solutions.

Establish a detailed, step-by-step action plan for troubleshooting, considering potential side effects on networks and systems. Apply change management and a rollback plan to ensure safe, informed implementations.

Implement the solution by applying the action plan, initiating continuous monitoring, and escalating with the right experts while communicating findings and verification results.

Verify that the implemented solution works by performing post-implementation confirmation testing and system-wide checks, then document the problem, steps, resources, changes, and outcomes for future reference.

Analyze how copper and fiber cabling face interference, mismatch, and physical issues, and apply shielding, proper cable management, labeling, and fiber type choices to maintain signal integrity.

Explore how interface metrics help troubleshoot networks by examining CRC errors, runts and giants, MTU, duplex, and drops. Learn to diagnose hardware, QoS, port status, PoE, transceivers, and cabling issues.

Examine layer two switching and routing issues through spanning tree protocol, root bridge election, and port roles, highlighting how misconfigurations and VLANs can cause forwarding loops and broadcasts.

Diagnose IP addressing issues using 169.254 addresses (APIPA/PIPA), DHCP scope exhaustion, and static misconfigurations, and apply fixes like expanding the pool, shortening leases, and using reservations.

examine common network traffic issues, distinguish bandwidth from throughput, identify congestion, latency, and bottlenecks, and apply qos and jitter buffers to prioritize real-time traffic like voice over ip.

Identify and address wireless issues such as interference, co-channel interference, channel bonding, auto-channel selection, and roaming, to maintain coverage and strong signal strength.

Explore essential Windows network commands for troubleshooting and diagnosing connectivity, including ipconfig, ping, dhcp lease management, nslookup, traceroute, netstat, arp, and route print.

Explore linux network commands for troubleshooting, including ping for reachability and ip for addresses. Learn name resolution with dig or nslookup, and use tcpdump or mtr for capture and tracing.

Explore hardware-based networking tools, including cable cutters, strippers, crimpers, and testers. Learn to test, terminate, and trace copper and fiber cables in structured wiring.

Explore protocol analyzers and packet capture utilities, including Wireshark, learn pcap analysis, traffic filtering, tcp handshakes, and wireless network assessment with a wi-fi analyzer and speed tests.

Explore essential network device commands for routers and switches, including show commands for gathering information and troubleshooting, and review interface details, VLAN configurations, MAC address tables, and routing.