Changes to PIM Settings

Severity: high
Time window: 1d
Author: Microsoft Security Research
Source: github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel

PIM provides a key mechanism for assigning privileges to accounts, this query detects changes to PIM role settings. Monitor these changes to ensure they are being made legitimately and don't confer more privileges than expected or reduce the security of a PIM elevation. Ref: https://docs.microsoft.com/azure/active-directory/fundamentals/security-operations-privileged-accounts#changes-to-privileged-accounts

MITRE ATT&CK coverage

Tactic	Techniques
Privilege Escalation	`T1078.004` Valid Accounts: Cloud Accounts

Telemetry coverage

Platform	Record / event type
Azure	Update role setting in PIM

Rules detecting the same action

These rules filter on the same operation.

Rule body

id: 0ed0fe7c-af29-4990-af7f-bb5ccb231198
name: Changes to PIM Settings
description: |
  'PIM provides a key mechanism for assigning privileges to accounts, this query detects changes to PIM role settings.
    Monitor these changes to ensure they are being made legitimately and don't confer more privileges than expected or reduce the security of a PIM elevation.
    Ref: https://docs.microsoft.com/azure/active-directory/fundamentals/security-operations-privileged-accounts#changes-to-privileged-accounts'
severity: High
requiredDataConnectors:
  - connectorId: AzureActiveDirectory
    dataTypes:
      - AuditLogs
queryFrequency: 1d
queryPeriod: 1d
triggerOperator: gt
triggerThreshold: 0
tactics:
  - PrivilegeEscalation
relevantTechniques:
  - T1078.004
tags:
  - AADSecOpsGuide
query: |
  AuditLogs
    | where Category =~ "RoleManagement"
    | where OperationName =~ "Update role setting in PIM"
    | extend InitiatingUserPrincipalName = tostring(InitiatedBy.user.userPrincipalName)
    | extend InitiatingAadUserId = tostring(InitiatedBy.user.id)
    | extend InitiatingIPAddress = tostring(InitiatedBy.user.ipAddress)
    | extend InitiatingAccountName = tostring(split(InitiatingUserPrincipalName, "@")[0]), InitiatingAccountUPNSuffix = tostring(split(InitiatingUserPrincipalName, "@")[1])
    | project-reorder TimeGenerated, OperationName, ResultReason, InitiatingUserPrincipalName, InitiatingAadUserId, InitiatingIPAddress, InitiatingAccountName, InitiatingAccountUPNSuffix
entityMappings:
  - entityType: Account
    fieldMappings:
      - identifier: FullName
        columnName: InitiatingUserPrincipalName
      - identifier: Name
        columnName: InitiatingAccountName
      - identifier: UPNSuffix
        columnName: InitiatingAccountUPNSuffix
  - entityType: Account
    fieldMappings:
      - identifier: AadUserId
        columnName: InitiatingAadUserId
  - entityType: IP
    fieldMappings:
      - identifier: Address
        columnName: InitiatingIPAddress
version: 1.1.1
kind: Scheduled
metadata:
    source:
        kind: Community
    author:
        name: Microsoft Security Research
    support:
        tier: Community
    categories:
        domains: [ "Security - Others", "Identity" ]

Stages and Predicates

Stage 1: `source`

AuditLogs

Stage 2: `where`

| where Category =~ "RoleManagement"

Stage 3: `where`

| where OperationName =~ "Update role setting in PIM"

Stage 4: `extend` (4 consecutive steps)

| extend InitiatingUserPrincipalName = tostring(InitiatedBy.user.userPrincipalName)
| extend InitiatingAadUserId = tostring(InitiatedBy.user.id)
| extend InitiatingIPAddress = tostring(InitiatedBy.user.ipAddress)
| extend InitiatingAccountName = tostring(split(InitiatingUserPrincipalName, "@")[0]), InitiatingAccountUPNSuffix = tostring(split(InitiatingUserPrincipalName, "@")[1])

Stage 5: `project-reorder`

| project-reorder TimeGenerated, OperationName, ResultReason, InitiatingUserPrincipalName, InitiatingAadUserId, InitiatingIPAddress, InitiatingAccountName, InitiatingAccountUPNSuffix

Indicators

These rows show field, operator, and value matches.

Field	Kind	Values	Search
`Category`	eq	`RoleManagement`	`field:"Category" kind:eq value:"RoleManagement"`
`OperationName`	eq	`Update role setting in PIM`	`field:"OperationName" kind:eq value:"Update role setting in PIM"`

Output fields

These fields are emitted when the rule matches.

Field	Source
`InitiatingUserPrincipalName`	`extend`
`InitiatingAadUserId`	`extend`
`InitiatingIPAddress`	`extend`
`InitiatingAccountName`	`extend`
`InitiatingAccountUPNSuffix`	`extend`