Question

A network engineer is hardening a Catalyst switch and wants to protect privileged EXEC mode. The running configuration currently contains both 'enable password Cisco123' and 'enable secret Str0ngP@ss'. When the engineer types 'enable' at the user EXEC prompt, which behavior occurs, and why?

Accepted Answer

The switch accepts only 'Str0ngP@ss' because 'enable secret' takes precedence and is stored as an MD5 hash, overriding the weaker 'enable password'.

Answer

The switch accepts either 'Cisco123' or 'Str0ngP@ss' because both credentials remain valid for privileged access.

Answer

The switch accepts only 'Cisco123' because 'enable password' is checked first in the configuration order.

Answer

The switch rejects all access to privileged mode until one of the two conflicting commands is removed.