Data transmission: past paper questions

Where the questions come from

• Question 4May/June 2026, paper 11Structured11 marks

  An optical mouse is connected to a computer using a universal serial bus (USB) cable. State the purpose of the optical mouse.

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• Question 2Oct/Nov 2025, paper 11Structured12 marks

  An employee of a company sells houses. He sends images of the houses to his company. The employee compresses the image files using lossy compression before sending them.

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• Question 4Oct/Nov 2024, paper 11Structured11 marks

  A company decides to create a network for its devices. All the company devices are within a single room. The employees will need to use their devices to send data to each other and share files.

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• Question 4Oct/Nov 2023, paper 11Structured7 marks

  Data is transmitted between a computer and a printer. The data is transmitted one bit at a time down a single wire. The computer can transmit data to the printer and the printer can transmit data to the computer, using the same connection.

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• Question 6May/June 2026, paper 11Structured10 marks

  Web pages need to be located and retrieved to be displayed on a device. Complete the paragraph about locating and retrieving web pages.

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• Question 7Oct/Nov 2025, paper 11Structured5 marks

  A theatre has a microphone on stage that is connected by cables to several speakers around the theatre. A person speaks into the microphone and their voice is output from the speakers. Identify the most appropriate data transmission method for this purpose.

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• Question 5Oct/Nov 2024, paper 12Structured12 marks

  A barcode scanning system uses a check digit to check for errors in data on input. Explain how the barcode scanning system operates to check for errors.

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• Question 7Oct/Nov 2023, paper 11Structured4 marks

  Complete the statements about data packets and packet switching.

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• Question 5Oct/Nov 2025, paper 12Structured10 marks

  A computer system has a mouse. An interrupt is sent to the CPU every time a button on the mouse is clicked. Identify the name of this type of interrupt.

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• Question 2Oct/Nov 2024, paper 13Structured24 marks

  An employee has a report that they need to email to their employer. The employee compresses the report file before emailing it. State the effect the compression has on the report file.

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• Question 6Oct/Nov 2023, paper 12Structured4 marks

  The table contains descriptions about data transmission methods. Complete the table by identifying which data transmission methods are described.

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• Question 4May/June 2026, paper 12Structured10 marks

  An odd parity byte check is used to check for errors in data that is transmitted from a computer to a printer. Three bytes of data need to be transmitted. Give the correct parity bit that would be added to each byte of data for an odd parity byte check.

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• Question 7Oct/Nov 2025, paper 12Structured16 marks

  A house has a smart speaker that can take voice commands as input. A person in the house can tell the smart speaker to play music or audio books. The smart speaker cannot be described as a robot.

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• Question 4May/June 2024, paper 11Structured7 marks

  Data packets are transmitted across a network from one computer to another computer. Describe the structure of a data packet.

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• Question 8Oct/Nov 2023, paper 12Structured6 marks

  Draw and annotate a diagram that demonstrates the cyber security threat of data interception.

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• Question 2May/June 2026, paper 13Structured15 marks

  Data is transmitted across a network. The bits of data are divided into sections that are each transmitted independently across the network to their destination. Identify the name given to these sections of data.

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• Question 3Oct/Nov 2025, paper 13Structured14 marks

  Data is split into packets before it is transmitted across a network. The diagram shows a packet with three sections. Complete the diagram by writing the name of each section of the packet.

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• Question 7May/June 2024, paper 11Structured4 marks

  Data is encrypted to keep it safe during transmission. Complete the paragraph about asymmetric encryption.

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• Question 4Oct/Nov 2023, paper 13Structured5 marks

  An employee uses a web browser on their computer. Describe the main purpose of a web browser.

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• Question 3May/June 2026, paper 23Structured11 marks

  Identify the type of test data in each description.

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• Question 4May/June 2025, paper 11Structured12 marks

  A restaurant has an electronic ordering system. The system allows customers to select the food they want to order. The data for the order is transmitted across their network to a computer in the restaurant kitchen.

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• Question 9May/June 2024, paper 11Structured20 marks

  A company owner has installed a new network. Data is correct before it is transmitted across the network. The company owner is concerned that data might have errors after transmission.

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• Question 5Oct/Nov 2023, paper 13Structured7 marks

  Errors can occur when data is transmitted. Give one reason an error may occur when data is transmitted.

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• Question 6May/June 2025, paper 11Structured9 marks

  Data can be encrypted using asymmetric encryption. Complete the paragraph about asymmetric encryption.

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• Question 2May/June 2024, paper 12Structured7 marks

  Data can be transmitted from one device to another. Tick (✓) one box to show which of the terms is not a method for transmitting data.

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• Question 2May/June 2023, paper 11Structured10 marks

  A student has a sound file that is too large to be stored on their external secondary storage device. The student compresses the sound file to make the file size smaller. The compression method used reduces the sample rate and the sample resolution of the sound file.

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• Question 3May/June 2025, paper 12Structured22 marks

  A programmer writes a program to store and sort all the data for the books in her home library. The programmer uses a high-level language to write the program.

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• Question 6May/June 2024, paper 12Structured5 marks

  The table contains statements about error detection methods. Complete the table by giving the correct error detection method for each statement.

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• Question 4May/June 2023, paper 12Structured9 marks

  A student uses a mobile phone to take photographs for a school project. The student needs to transmit the photographs to their computer. They could use serial data transmission or parallel data transmission to transmit the photographs.

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• Question 6May/June 2025, paper 13Structured15 marks

  A weather station uses automated systems to collect and analyse data about the weather. The automated system uses sensors. Give one other component that would be part of the automated system.

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