Extremely Slow Performance Since Defender Was Pushed on Us
Compliance, Security, Protection, and Defender are all extremely slow, with responses from screen to screen ranging from 30 seconds to multiple minutes between clicking items and waiting for Microsoft cloud to return results. I have a GB link and speed test well over 600 Mbps so it's not on my end. It appears the cutover in late January to this new "Defender" platform has been extremely detrimental to the Office portal response times in these portals. What is being done to resolve this?
User app registration - exploitable for BEC?
Hello. Recently dealt with a case of BEC. I'm not trained in forensics, but doing my best. Appears the hacker used an application called eM Client for their attack, getting access to a user's mailbox and hijacking a thread. I can see the login from two weeks ago (the incident was only noticed a couple days ago, however) - from a European country that SHOULD have been blocked by Conditional Access. Come to find out, the tenant conditional access was unassigned from everyone. We're not sure how - we re-enabled it, and audited changes, but the only change that appears was us re-enabling it. Which I thought indicates it was never configured right, except we've got a ticket documenting a change to Conditional Access a couple days after the hack that ALSO does not appear in the logs. So... it's likely it was changed, yet I have no record of that change (atleast, not through Entra > Monitoring > Auditing). If anyone knows any other ways of checking this, please advise - but I can't seem to even access our Diagnostic settings, the page tells me I need an Azure Active Directory subscription (I'm on Entra ID P1, which includes AAD.... this might be related to being global admin, and not Security Admin - we don't use that role in this relationship) ANYWAY, my amateur forensic skills have found that the attacker used an app called eM Client to get access. I'm not sure yet how they obtained the password, and got past MFA... But quick research shows this application (esp it's pro version) is known for use in BEC. The app was registered in Entra, and granted certain read permissions in Entra ID for shared mailboxes, presumably to find a decent thread to hijack. I'm not 100% sure yet there was any actual exploit done using this app, but it's popularity amongst hackers implies it does SOMETHING useful (i think remember that it authenticates using Exchange Web Services instead of Exchange Online, or something similar? Will update when I have the chance to check). We're in the process of improving our Secure Score, and this incident makes me think user's ability to register apps should be locked down. Checked Secure Score for this, and while there ARE recommendations around apps, disabling user app registration is NOT one of them. Just curious about people's thoughts. I just barely understand App Registration in Entra, but if this is a known attack vector, I would think disabling app registration would be a security recommendation?
Insider Builds
I have been an avid Microsoft user for many years with only a couple of small issues every now and again. The 6 weeks have been unbelievably stressful and disheartening. I thought trying samples of New Insider builds and enlisting in Azure for some up to date training for myself to help with what I wanted to roll out for my business. This has been the worst experience i have ever been apart of. I now have multiple computers and hardware in disarray but more importantly the loss of time and patience is paramount . I have come to realise the repetitive responses and requests for data collection on feedback or issues is one-sided The amount of user data submissions is not the issue though. It is the assistance from Microsoft regarding issue via portals, help-desk etc. The inclusion of many backend functions for the purpose of better user experience is heavily flawed. Unless end-user inadvertently has or encounters issues in there OS life is good. Heavily automated program tiggers sit through all OS builds for example. One drive. Regardless whether this is declined or removed it will always be running in the background. If you system had been compromised this is a perfect place for root-kit other Malware to spread. Xcopy: A Microsoft background function which has the ability clone and copy 99% of drivers of operating info structure. Can be controlled by ghost script directives or embedded dll to aid malware. Anti-virus or defender find difficulties identifying or distinguishing authentic and re-pro-ducted data. In time this type of incursion can mimic a vast amount of OS functionality. Microsoft OS validity. I have trailed numerous builds with all sharing this characteristic. Invalid or expired software and driver certificates & TPM flaws even after a full clean reset and TPM turned off in bios. Inevitably this can introduce compromised software without end-user knowledge. The impact leads to unauthorised access in many elements of the OS platform especially data access and embedded .dll which can run inline or above elevated authorisation. A lot of this is undetectable. Once embedded in OS and bios this is impossible to clean without expert assistance and can be very costly. For the most part the inclusion of new AI functionality across the OS platform is very welcomed. Unfortunately there are a large amount of bugs to be ironed out especially in the platform navigation. Advice provided via OS AI can be mis-leading or incorrect. .
Codesigning with ECC certificate (rather than RSA) - works with SmartScreen?
Hello, Newbie here at the MS tech community, hope I'm posting this in the right spot. I have a seemingly straightforward question that I haven't found an answer to yet: Does Defender Smartscreen work with code signing certificates that use an ECC algorithm, instead of an RSA algorithm? The story here is: I recently purchased an EV code signing certificate from Sectigo. Following directions provided by Sectigo, I had secured my EV certificate on a Yubikey. For this, I had to choose one of the ECC algorithms, not RSA. Then I used this certificate to code sign a new build of one of my apps. When a user runs an application that has been signed with an EV certificate, they should not see the SmartScreen warning message that “Running this app might put your PC at risk” (like in the attached screenshot). However, I am getting that SmartScreen warning with it, every time. I submitted the signed app to Microsoft's online malware analysis tool. The analysts there wrote back that "the files submitted are now determined as clean” and that “the application has since established reputation and attempting to download or run the application should no longer show any warnings." Sadly, on my Windows 10 and Windows 11 systems, it is still showing the SmartScreen warning. (To be clear, I have never "clicked through" the warnings for it, and told it "run anyway", for testing purposes.) Other software devs I have spoken with, who are using certificates with RSA crypto, have not had this problem. So I am left wondering if that difference is the issue. Thank you, Leigh
Website incorrectly flagged as security threat (Safe Links false-positive)
Hi, Our SaaS-website atleta.cc is currently incorrectly flagged as security threat by Microsoft Defender / Safe Links. This is causing trouble for clients and customers of clients in Outlook, Edge etc. Where can we report this false-positive, or request removal from the block list? Thank you! Greetings, Jarno Example:
Microsoft's recommendation regarding traffic inspection of m365 traffic
Hi, does anyone know, what is microsoft's official recommendation to prevent any attackers from distributing malware via microsoft's own cloud resources like discussed at Cloud storage from Microsoft, Google used in malware attacks • The Register? According to microsoft's networking principles, traffic related to Microsoft 365 shouldn't be inspected by any networking component and routed directly to microsoft (bypassing proxies and other traffic inspection solutions). How can this be configured safely, when there is such attack path?
When running New-DkimSigningConfig getting "Error in retrieving encrypted key"
I am trying to configure Dkim for a new custom domain name I have added to my tenant but receiving the error "Error in retrieving encrypted key" New-DkimSigningConfig -DomainName mydomainname.com -Enabled $false Error in retrieving encrypted key. + CategoryInfo : InvalidArgument: (:) [New-DkimSigningConfig], ValidationException + FullyQualifiedErrorId : [Server=PN2P287MB0256,RequestId=118bbafe-fead-42f2-b0de-ca595eba53b9,TimeStamp=25-08-2022 07 :28:38] [FailureCategory=Cmdlet-ValidationException] 2C2648B2,Microsoft.Exchange.Management.SystemConfigurationTasks.N ewDkimSigningConfig + PSComputerName : outlook.office365.com
Quarantine "finger print matching" false positive
Just done my regular quarantine check on our O365 tenant and was surprised to find a couple of legit messages from an external sender which were flagged as High Confidence Phish based on finger print matching, which I understand translates to a close match to a previously detected malicious message. I can see absolutely nothing wrong with the message and it was so very business specific in its content that I cannot see that it would closely match anything else that had ever gone before. The recipient tells me they regularly exchange business emails with the sender without any issue. When I run off a report and look at other recent messages caught by finger print matching on my tenant, they were the usual phishing emails that are probably doing the rounds globally and were correctly trapped. Questions are: 1. Anyone know why something so highly specific in its content would be trapped in this way? 2. I feel I can't trust O365 to correctly quarantine based on this example, but High Confidence Phish is currently set to have the AdminOnlyAccessPolicy applied on my tenant - and this doesn't notify. Is there any way for a sys admin (only) to be notified by email when something goes into quarantine? I can set up a custom policy to allow RECIPIENT notification but I don't really want to involve them when messages are being correctly quarantined almost all of the time. Ours is a non-profit tenant so I can't be sitting around watching it all day - I need it to tell me when something has happened! Thanks for any ideas!New Blog | Secure your AI transformation with Microsoft Security
By Daniela Villarreal Generative AI is reshaping business today for every individual, every team, and every industry. Organizations engage with GenAI in a variety of ways – from purchasing and using finished GenAI apps to developing, deploying, and operating custom-built GenAI apps. GenAI broadens the attack surface of applications through prompts, training data, models, and more – thereby effectively changing the threat landscape with new risks such as direct or indirect prompt injection attacks, data leakage, and data oversharing. In March this year, we shared how Microsoft Security helps organizations discover, protect, and govern the use of GenAI apps like Copilot for M365. Today, we’re thrilled to introduce additional capabilities for that scenario and new capabilities to secure and govern the development, deployment, and runtime of custom-built GenAI apps. With these new innovations, Microsoft Security is at the forefront of AI security to support our customers on their AI journey by being the first security solution provider to offer threat protection for AI workloads and providing comprehensive security to secure and govern AI usage and applications. Secure and govern GenAI you build: Discover new AI attack surfaces with AI security posture management (AI-SPM) in Microsoft Defender for Cloud for AI apps using Azure OpenAI Service, Azure Machine Learning, and Amazon Bedrock Protect your AI apps using Azure OpenAI in runtime with threat protection for AI workloads in Microsoft Defender for Cloud, the first cloud-native application protection platform (CNAPP) to provide runtime protection for enterprise-built AI apps using Azure OpenAI Service Secure and govern GenAI you use: Discover and mitigate data security and compliance risks with Microsoft Purview AI Hub, now offering new insights, including visibility into unlabeled data and SharePoint sites that are referenced by Copilot for M365 and non-compliant usage such as regulatory collusion, money laundering, and targeted harassment for M365 interactions Govern AI use to comply with regulatory requirements with 4 new AI compliance assessments in Microsoft Purview Compliance Manager Discover new AI attack surfaces As organizations embrace GenAI, many accelerate adoption with pre-built GenAI applications while others choose to develop GenAI applications in-house, tailored to their unique use cases, security controls and compliance requirements. Organizations from all industries are racing to transform their applications with AI, with over half of Fortune 500 companies using Azure OpenAI. With all the new components of AI workloads such as models, SDKs, training, and grounding data – the visibility into understanding all the configurations of these new components and the risks associated with them is more important than ever. With new AI security posture management (AI-SPM) capabilities in Microsoft Defender for Cloud, security admins can continuously discover and inventory their organization’s AI components across Azure OpenAI Service, Azure Machine Learning, and Amazon Bedrock – including models, SDKs, and data – as well as sensitive data used in grounding, training, and fine tuning LLMs. Admins can find vulnerabilities, identify exploitable attack paths, and easily remediate risks to get ahead of active threats. Figure 1: Attack path analysis in Defender for Cloud identifies an indirect risk to an Azure OpenAI resource where an attacker can exploit vulnerabilities via an internet exposed VM to potentially gain access and control of the AI resource, model deployments, and data. Read the full post here: Secure your AI transformation with Microsoft SecurityNew Blog | Microsoft named overall leader in KuppingerCole Leadership Compass for ITDR
By Alex Weinert This blog was co-authored by Alex Weinert, VP Identity Security and Ramya Chitrakar, CVP Apps and Identity. Chances are you’ve heard the phrase “attackers don’t break in, they log in.” Identities have evolved to be the most targeted asset, because they enable cyber criminals to move and operate across environments to achieve their goals. In 2023, identity-based attacks reached a record-high with 30 billion attempted password attacks each month, as cyber-criminals capitalize on the smallest misconfigurations and gaps in your identity protection. As customers have applied MFA, device compliance, and other Zero Trust core principles to their identity environments, attackers have shifted to attacking the identity infrastructure itself. While it is critical to protect all identities – identifying, preventing, detecting and responding to attacks on the Identity admins, apps, and services that provide the foundation of your Zero Trust platform is more critical than ever. That’s why it’s critical for organizations to build a holistic approach to defend their identity estate across both - on-prem infrastructure and cloud identities - by making Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) a cornerstone of their defense strategy. KuppingerCole defines ITDR as a class of security solutions designed to proactively detect, investigate, and respond to identity-related threats and vulnerabilities in an organization's IT environment. Today we are thrilled to announce that Microsoft has been recognized as an overall leader in the KuppingerCole Leadership Compass Identity Threat Detection and Response: IAM Meets the SOC. The report calls out our strengths across key capabilities ranging from identity posture to remediation, while further highlighting Microsoft’s commitment to protecting all organizations. VP KuppingerCole US and Global Head of Research Strategy Mike Neuenschwander states that “Microsoft’s approach to ITDR is refreshingly open, including integration with other cloud identity platforms such as AWS, Google Cloud, and Okta.”. Figure 1: ITDR Leadership compass with Microsoft as a leader Read the full post here: Microsoft named overall leader in KuppingerCole Leadership Compass for ITDR
