Splunk Enterprise Certified Admin Practice Test 2025 - Free Splunk Admin Practice Questions and Study Guide

A forwarder in Splunk uses the TCP protocol to transmit data to an indexer. This is crucial because TCP is a connection-oriented protocol that ensures reliable data transmission. It guarantees that all data sent from the forwarder to the indexer is received in the correct order and without loss, which is essential for maintaining the integrity of the logs and events being processed.

Unlike protocols such as UDP, which do not assure delivery and can result in lost packets, or FTP, which is primarily geared towards file transfers rather than real-time data streaming, TCP's reliability makes it a suitable choice for sending event data that needs to be indexed and searched efficiently. HTTP, while often used for web communications, is not the primary protocol for data transmission from forwarders to indexers in this context. Therefore, utilizing TCP underpins the reliability and accuracy of the data ingestion process in a Splunk architecture.