In a forward zone, what happens to queries that cannot be answered locally?

• A. They are forwarded to the specified forwarders
• B. They are answered from cache only
• C. They are rejected
• D. They are sent to root servers directly

Answer: (A)

Forward zones delegate external lookups to designated forwarders. When a query can’t be answered from the zone’s own data or cache, the DNS server forwards that query to the configured forwarders. Those forwarders then resolve the name by querying upstream servers and return the answer back to the client. This behavior centralizes and controls outbound resolution. The other options don’t fit because the zone isn’t limited to cache-only responses, isn’t automatically rejected, and isn’t normally sent straight to root servers in standard forward-zone operation; root-server access would only come into play if forwarders are unavailable or not used, depending on the server’s settings.