A team enabled versioning on an S3 bucket last year. A new administrator wants to turn versioning off completely so the bucket returns to its original unversioned state. What can the administrator actually do?
- Disable versioning, which deletes all previous object versions
- Suspend versioning; existing versions are kept and new uploads stop creating versions
- Disable versioning only after emptying the bucket
- Nothing; versioning can never be changed once enabled
Correct answer: B. Suspend versioning; existing versions are kept and new uploads stop creating versions
Once versioning has been enabled on a bucket, the bucket can never return to the unversioned state. The only available change is to suspend versioning. Suspension preserves every existing object version exactly as it is, and from that point new uploads receive a null version ID instead of stacking new versions. Nothing is deleted automatically, so option A describes behaviour that does not exist and would be dangerous if it did. Emptying the bucket does not unlock a disable option either. Option D overstates the restriction, since suspension is a real state change. The exam frequently tests this exact enabled-versus-suspended distinction.
Source: AWS S3 docs: Using versioning in S3 buckets — versioning states