Question

Difficulty: MediumCommon Ports and Protocols

A network technician is setting up an automated boot-server infrastructure to distribute basic initialization configuration files to newly unboxed network switches across different subnets. The process relies on Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) for lightweight, connectionless file transfer. Which transport layer protocol and destination port number must be allowed through the intermediate firewalls to permit this traffic?

  1. UDP port 69Answer
  2. B
    TCP port 69
  3. C
    TCP port 21
  4. D
    UDP port 67

Answer

UDP port 69 is required for Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) communication.
The correct answer specifies UDP port 69. Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) is a simplified file transfer protocol that operates over UDP on standard destination port 69, making it ideal for low-overhead bootstrap file distribution to network devices.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Identify the protocol requirements specified in the scenario.
The scenario requires configuring firewall rules for Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP).
TFTP is a lightweight file transfer protocol frequently used for bootstrap file loading and network hardware firmware provisioning.
2
Determine the transport protocol and default port used by TFTP.
TFTP operates at the application layer and uses UDP at the transport layer on destination port 69.
Unlike standard FTP which uses TCP ports 20 and 21 for reliable connection-oriented transfer, TFTP is designed for simple, minimal overhead operations using connectionless UDP.

Key Concept

Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) Port and Transport Protocol
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