Microsoft Sentinel and Defender: ITSM Integrations Explained
One of the main changes and advantages of onboarding Microsoft Sentinel to the Defender portal is the fact that alerts are automatically correlated into single incidents. Alert correlation will kick in when we have enough evidence that multiple alerts are related. This has great benefits, as it can quickly unveil multi-stage attacks that otherwise could look like unrelated harmless alerts. It also helps reduce the amount of incidents by merging those that are related. However, each organization has its own internal processes, teams, etc., so transitioning to this new way of working can be challenging. Furthermore, for organizations that use external ITSM tools to manage their incidents and alerts this means the logic in the incident synchronization must be considered before onboarding Microsoft Sentinel on Defender. This is critical as you will need to make sure that updates on incidents due to correlation are properly reflected on your tool. In this article, we will review the most relevant fields in the Azure management API and in the Microsoft security graph API. If you are building a new integration, we recommend transitioning to the Microsoft Graph security API. However, if you have an existing integration relying on the Microsoft Sentinel REST APIs, you can simply update what you have. If you are using ServiceNow as your ITSM tool, we recommend using this out-of-the-box app provided by ServiceNow. It relies on the Azure Management API: Microsoft Sentinel - ServiceNow Store. The latest version includes improvements that take care of the correlation logic. If you are using a different ITSM tool with an out-of-the-box integration, we recommend checking whether the latest version available already covers this change in the logic. Otherwise, if you wish to update or create your own integration logic, we are providing some guidance below. How does the correlation logic affect incidents Understanding how the correlation logic affects incidents and when it kicks in is the first step. We recommend reading our official documentation, which explains different scenarios for Incident correlation and merging. However, below we will describe in more detail how correlation affects incidents, bearing in mind how this can influence synchronization with external ITSM systems. Since correlation will automatically move alerts and close incidents, you need to understand how this works and check if your synchronization logic need modifications. When two or more alerts are identified as related, they are aggregated into a single incident. This can happen in two ways: Existing incidents: Alerts from different incidents may be moved into a new or existing “target” incident. The original (“source”) incidents will lose those alerts and will be automatically closed. On Defender, any references to the ”source” incident will be redirected to the “target” incident. On Microsoft Sentinel on Azure, you will still see the old incident, although it will be closed, it will contain the tag “redirected” and it will contain a link to the “target” incident. New alerts: Alerts that are not yet part of any incident may be directly added to the “target” incident. Please keep in mind that Sentinel alerts that are triggered without an incident (which is possible through the Sentinel analytic rules settings) will not be considered for correlation. In other words, when Sentinel alerts are correlated to a target incident, there will always be a “source” incident which will be closed. We recommend reading about the criteria for merging incidents is, as well as specific scenarios when incidents aren't merged. Using the Microsoft Sentinel REST APIs If you have an existing integration based on the Microsoft Sentinel REST APIs, these are the relevant endpoints: Get all incidents Incidents - List - REST API (Azure Sentinel) | Microsoft Learn Get a specific incident Incidents - Get - REST API (Azure Sentinel) | Microsoft Learn Get all alerts for a specific incident Incidents - List Alerts - REST API (Azure Sentinel) | Microsoft Learn What we observe in most organizations with external ITSM systems is that they generally synchronize incidents only, not alerts; and their analysts go to Microsoft Sentinel to view the alerts and other details, hunt, etc. Therefore, we will focus on the endpoint to get all incidents, which is probably the endpoint you are using today. Let us have a look at the payload for an incident that has been closed due to redirection: These are the relevant fields for you: id: Resource ID of the incident on Azure, now closed name: the incident GUID on Azure title: The source incident title (now closed, the new incident will probably have a different name) status: it will always be closed in this scenario labelName: It will always be redirected in this scenario, this tag is automatically added to incidents closed by automatic alert correlation incidentNumber: the incident number of the source incident in Azure alertCount: this will always be zero in this scenario, as the incident was emptied and alerts were transferred to the target incident providerIncidentUrl: The url of the target incident on Defender where you can find the transferred alerts providerName: Once you onboard your Microsoft Sentinel workspace to Defender, this field will always be Microsoft XDR, as all incidents (also Sentinel incidents) are created on Defender providerIncidentId: the target incident ID on Defender Updates you could make A logic you could implement is to have an automation rule that detects when an incident is updated with the tag “Redirected”: This should trigger a logic app that calls your ITSM system: On your ITSM system, make sure you are mapping the providerIncidentUrl (link to Defender), this is important for two reasons: The link on the ITSM system should take your analysts to Defender, as it contains all the details of the incident and the alerts The API only references the url of the target incident on Defender. Since you probably want to update the target incident on your ITSM system, you will need to find the “providerIncidentUrl” on your system. Close the source incident on the ITSM system Update the source incident on the ITSM system with a description/comment with a link to the providerIncidentUrl (which is the URL of the target incident) On the target incident (providerIncidentUrl) on the ITSM system, add a description/comment mentioning the incident absorbed the alerts from the former incident Potentially increase severity of your target incident on the ITSM system Other more complex logics could include updating the owner. Important! Bear in mind that Incident provider is no longer a condition you can select on Defender because, once you onboard Microsoft Sentinel to Defender, the incident provider is always Microsoft Defender XDR. If you use this condition today, please change it to Alert product names instead (if you wish to make a distinction between different alert providers) The incident title is no longer predictable, as incident names can change through merging. If you use incident title as a condition, please change it to Analytic rule name and select the analytic rule that should trigger the automation. You can use mariocuomo 's script, which generates a report with a list of all automation rules that contain either of these conditions, so you can update them before transitioned to Defender: mariocuomo/Sentinel-Transition-To-Defender-Helper-Script: This repository contains an helper script that I developed to assist Sentinel customer to adopt Sentinel in Defender. While other changes should not affect you in this logic, we recommend reading Configure automation rules and playbooks in Defender to understand what else changes. Using the Microsoft Graph security API If you are building a new integration, or if your previous integration needs multiple updates, we recommend creating your integration based on the Microsoft Graph security API. This is the API endpoint in the Microsoft security graph API to get your incidents: https://graph.microsoft.com/beta/security/incidents If you want to get alerts under your incidents as well, please use this endpoint to get incidents and corresponding alerts: https://graph.microsoft.com/beta/security/incidents?$expand=alerts Important! Please note that alerts triggered by Sentinel analytic rules where an incident is not created are not visible on Defender, although they will be visible on the SecurityAlert table (either on the Microsoft Sentinel Azure portal, or on Defender in Advanced Hunting). This means that the Microsoft Graph security APIs cannot be used yet to submit your alerts to an ITSM system. If you wish to send alerts to an ITSM system, please use the Microsoft Sentinel REST APIs. Now, let’s have a look at the API response for an incident that was redirected: These are the relevant fields for you: id: The id of the source incident on Defender status: it will always be “redirected” in this scenario. incidentWebUrl: this is the url of the source incident on Defender, now redirected redirectIncidentId: the ID of the target incident on Defender lastModifiedBy: In this scenario you will always see Microsoft 365 Defender-AlertCorrelation As you probably noticed, in the Graph API you will not find Azure Sentinel fields. What would my logic look like Assuming you are using the Microsoft Graph security API, you are already streaming your Defender incidents to your ITSM system. If you want to update your logic to close source incidents where alerts have been transferred to a target incident, your logic could look like this: Run a logic app every few minutes to check for incidents that changed the status to “redirected”. You can do it through such an API call: https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/security/incidents?$filter=status eq 'redirected' and lastUpdateDateTime ge 2025-09-03T11:15:00Z (add the correct timestamp here) Now, you can find those incidents on your ITSM system and update them: Close them on the ITSM system Add a description or comment with the new incident (redirectIncidentId) You could make more changes, like going to the target incident on your ITSM system and detail there that your incident has absorbed alerts from a source incident. Remember you can add tags to your incidents on Defender too, such as the incident ID on your ITSM system. This will make synchronization easier. You can refer to the field “customTags” for this purpose. Special thanks to my colleagues NChristis, sagiyagen365 and BenjiSec for reviewing and contributing to this article!
Microsoft 365 defender alerts not capturing fields (entities) in azure sentinel
We got an alert from 365 defenders to azure sentinel ( A potentially malicious URL click was detected). To investigate this alert we have to check in the 365 defender portal. We noticed that entities are not capturing (user, host, IP). How can we resolve this issue? Note: This is not a custom rule.
Advanced Hunting Query Help
Hey y'all, I'm trying to write a query that can be used to determine the number of times an each IOC generated an alert (file hash, URL, IP, etc). I'm using the query builder tool within Defender, and I'm looking into the AlertInfo and AlertEvidence tables, but I'm not seeing where the link exists between each of these alert records and the corresponding IOC. For instance. If I submit a custom indicator, to Block a file identified by a sha256 hash, and that file gets correctly blocked, I want to see a count for the number of times that IOC value (the hash in this instance) triggered an alert. I'm hoping the community can help me determine whether I'm missing something glaringly obvious or if there's some documentation I haven't read yet. Thanks for reading!
Lack of alerts in Sentinel
Hello, I am troubleshooting a lack of alerts and incidents in my Sentinel deployment. When I look at the Micrsoft Defender XDR connector, I see plenty of events like DeviceEvents, DeviceInfo, IdentityLogonEvents, etc. However, the entries for: SecurityIncident-- SecurityAlert-- AlertInfo-- AlertEvidence-- all show grey with a disconnected connector showing. I've been over the onboarding documentation several times and can't find what I'm missing. Has anyone else experienced this who can point me in the right direction of what to check? Thanks!
MSSP Multi-Tenant Handling with Lighthouse and Defender XDR
Hello, As far as I know an MSSP providers, leverages Azure Lighthouse to call and access multiple customer workspaces, which allows to manage analytics across tenants. My questions are: In the case of moving to Defender XDR, how would this be possible in a multi-tenant MSSP scenario? Even with Lighthouse, how does Defender XDR avoid merging incidents/alerts across different customers when the same entities are involved? How does Defender XDR differentiate identical IOCs (same IP, hash, etc.) that appear in multiple customers? Can MSSPs customize correlation logic to prevent false cross-tenant merges? Content Ownership & Sharing Most MSSPs do not want to share their proprietary content (custom rules, detections, playbooks, analytics, etc.) with customers. How is Defender XDR approaching this requirement to ensure MSSPs can operate without exposing their intellectual property? Example: Customer Test 1 has a port scan incident from IP 10.10.10.10. Customer Test 2 also has a port scan incident from the same IP 10.10.10.10. In Sentinel today, these would remain separate. But in Defender XDR, would these two alerts risk being merged into a single incident because the same entity is detected across tenants? Thanks in advance for any clarification.
Device Tables are not ingesting tables for an orgs workspace
Device Tables are not ingesting tables for an orgs workspace. I can confirm that all devices are enrolled and onboarded to MDE (Microsoft defender for endpoint) I had placed an EICAR file on one of the machine which bought an alert through to sentinel,however this did not invoke any of the device related tables . Workspace i am targeting Workspace from another org with tables enabled and ingesting data Microsoft Defender XDR connector shows as connected however the tables do not seem to be ingesting data; I run the following; DeviceEvents | where TimeGenerated > ago(15m) | top 20 by TimeGenerated DeviceProcessEvents | where TimeGenerated > ago(15m) | top 20 by TimeGenerated I receive no results; No results found from the specified time range Try selecting another time range Please assist As I cannot think where this is failing
Deep Dive into Preview Features in Microsoft Defender Console
Background for Discussion Microsoft Defender XDR (Extended Detection and Response) is evolving rapidly, offering enhanced security capabilities through preview features that can be enabled in the MDE console. These preview features are accessible via: Path: Settings > Microsoft Defender XDR > General > Preview features Under this section, users can opt into three distinct integrations: Microsoft Defender XDR + Microsoft Defender for Identity Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Each of these options unlocks advanced functionalities that improve threat detection, incident correlation, and response automation across identity, endpoint, and cloud environments. However, enabling these features is optional and may depend on organizational readiness or policy. This raises important questions about: What specific technical capabilities are introduced by each preview feature? Where exactly are these feature parameters are reflected in the MDE console? What happens if an organization chooses not to enable these preview features? Are there alternative ways to access similar functionalities through public preview or general availability?
Single Rule for No logs receiving (Global + Per-device Thresholds)
Hi everyone, I currently maintain one Analytics rule per table to detect when logs stop coming in. Some tables receive data from multiple sources, each with a different expected interval (for example, some sources send every 10 minutes, others every 30 minutes). In other SIEM platforms there’s usually: A global threshold (e.g., 60 minutes) for all sources. Optional per-device/per-table thresholds that override the global value. Is there a recommended way to implement one global rule that uses a default threshold but allows per-source overrides when a particular device or log table has a different expected frequency? Also, if there are other approaches you use to manage “logs not received” detection, I’d love to hear your suggestions as well. This is a sample of my current rule let threshold = 1h; AzureActivity | summarize LastHeartBeat = max(TimeGenerated) | where LastHeartBeat < ago(threshold)How to: Ingest Splunk alert data to Microsoft Sentinel SIEM
Thanks to Javier Soriano, Principal Product Manager - OneSOC Customer Experience Engineering, for the peer review Introduction Although the recommended approach is to not have multiple SIEM solutions in place, many organizations are still running dual-SIEM setups, sometimes even introducing additional ones in the mix. Combination most often seen is running a legacy solution and pairing it with modern SIEM solutions like Microsoft Sentinel SIEM. Side-by-side architecture is recommended for just long enough to complete the migration, train people and update processes - but organizations might stay with the side-by-side configuration longer when they are not ready to move away from legacy solutions. In such situations, organizations usually opt for sending alerts from their legacy SIEM to Sentinel SIEM: Cloud data is ingested and analyzed in Sentinel SIEM On-premises data is ingested and analyzed in legacy SIEM which generates alerts Alerts are forwarded from legacy SIEM to Sentinel SIEM With this approach, SOC teams have a single interface where they are able to cross-correlate and investigate alerts from their organizations while benefiting from full value of unified security operations in Microsoft Defender. Send Splunk alerts to Sentinel SIEM Splunk side When an alert is raised in Splunk, organizations have an option to set up following alert actions: Email notification action Webhook alert action Output results to a CSV lookup Log events Monitor triggered alerts Send alerts and dashboards to Splunk Mobile Users Interestingly, it is possible to work with Webhooks to make an HTTP POST request on a URL. The data is in JSON format which makes it easily consumable by Sentinel SIEM. For this to work, Splunk needs the hook URL from the target source (in this case, Sentinel SIEM). { "result": { "sourcetype" : "mongod", "count" : "8" }, "sid" : "scheduler_admin_search_W2_at_14232356_132", "results_link" : "http://web.example.local:8000/app/search/@go?sid=scheduler_admin_search_W2_at_14232356_132", "search_name" : null, "owner" : "admin", "app" : "search" } Example: Splunk alert JSON payload Microsoft side From Microsoft perspective, organizations can take advantage of Logs Ingestion API, which allows for any application that can make a REST API call to send data to Sentinel SIEM. To configure Logs Ingestion API, a couple of supporting resources are needed: Microsoft Entra application which will authenticate against the API Custom table in Log Analytics workspace, where the data will be sent to and accessible from Sentinel SIEM Data Collection Rule (DCR) which will direct data to the target custom table Entra application from the first step needs to have RBAC assigned on the DCR resource A solution to call Logs Ingestion API so the data can be sent to the Sentinel SIEM. In order to make this process streamlined and easy to deploy, a solution has been developed which will automate creation of all of these supporting resources and allow you to have a Webhook URL ready which can be just placed in your Splunk solution: https://github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel/tree/master/Tools/SplunkAlertIngestion Picture: Content of the solution The script with supporting ARM templates can be run directly from the Azure Cloud Shell and configured with a couple of parameters: ./SplunkAlertIngestion.ps1 -ServicePrincipalName "" -tableName "" -workspaceResourceId "" -dataCollectionRuleName "" -location "" ServicePrincipalName - mandatory, define a name for the SP tableName - mandatory, define a name for the custom table with the suffix _CL (example: SplunkAlertInfo_CL) workspaceResourceId - mandatory, the resourceId can be fetched from the Log Analytics Workspace Properties blade (/subscriptions/xxx-xxx/resourceGroups/xxx/providers/Microsoft.OperationalInsights/workspaces/xxx) dataCollectionRuleName - mandatory, define DCR name location - mandatory, define Azure location for the resources (example: northeurope, eastus2) LogicAppName - not mandatory, define the name for the LogicApp, otherwise it will be named SplunkAlertAutomationLogicApp Result The script will create all supporting resources that are needed and will provide the Webhook URL as an output. Use this URL to configure trigger action in Splunk: Picture: Instructions for configuring webhook alert action in Splunk Once the webhook is configured on Splunk side, any time the alert is raised it will trigger the webhook, which will initiate the Logic App resource on Azure side responsible for parsing the data and sending that data through Logs Ingestion API to the destination table in Sentinel SIEM. Picture: Workflow of the Logic App Conclusion Ingesting alert data from other solutions in your organization to Sentinel SIEM allows for security teams to take advantage of unified security operations in Microsoft Defender - easier cross-correlation between various data sources, comprehensive threat intelligence and case management experience.
