Microsoft Sentinel’s AI-driven UEBA ushers in the next era of behavioral analytics
Co-author - Ashwin Patil Security teams today face an overwhelming challenge: every data point is now a potential security signal and SOCs are drowning in complex logs, trying to find the needle in the haystack. Microsoft Sentinel User and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) brings the power of AI to automatically surface anomalous behaviors, helping analysts cut through the noise, save time, and focus on what truly matters. Microsoft Sentinel UEBA has already helped SOCs uncover insider threats, detect compromised accounts, and reveal subtle attack signals that traditional rule-based methods often miss. These capabilities were previously powered by a core set of high-value data sources - such as sign-in activity, audit logs, and identity signals - that consistently delivered rich context and accurate detections. Today, we’re excited to announce a major expansion: Sentinel UEBA now supports six new data sources including Microsoft first- and third-party platforms like Azure, AWS, GCP, and Okta, bringing deeper visibility, broader context, and more powerful anomaly detection tailored to your environment. This isn’t just about ingesting more logs. It’s about transforming how SOCs understand behavior, detect threats, and prioritize response. With this evolution, analysts gain a unified, cross-platform view of user and entity behavior, enabling them to correlate signals, uncover hidden risks, and act faster with greater confidence. Newly supported data sources are built for real-world security use cases: Authentication activities MDE DeviceLogonEvents – Ideal for spotting lateral movement and unusual access. AADManagedIdentitySignInLogs – Critical for spotting stealthy abuse of non - human identities. AADServicePrincipalSignInLogs - Identifying anomalies in service principal usage such as token theft or over - privileged automation. Cloud platforms & identity management AWS CloudTrail Login Events - Surfaces risky AWS account activity based on AWS CloudTrail ConsoleLogin events and logon related attributes. GCP Audit Logs - Failed IAM Access, Captures denied access attempts indicating reconnaissance, brute force, or privilege misuse in GCP. Okta MFA & Auth Security Change Events – Flags MFA challenges, resets, and policy modifications that may reveal MFA fatigue, session hijacking, or policy tampering. Currently supports the Okta_CL table (unified Okta connector support coming soon). These sources feed directly into UEBA’s entity profiles and baselines - enriching users, devices, and service identities with behavioral context and anomalies that would otherwise be fragmented across platforms. This will complement our existing supported log sources - monitoring Entra ID sign-in logs, Azure Activity logs and Windows Security Events. Due to the unified schema available across data sources, UEBA enables feature-rich investigation and the capability to correlate across data sources, cross platform identities or devices insights, anomalies, and more. AI-powered UEBA that understands your environment Microsoft Sentinel UEBA goes beyond simple log collection - it continuously learns from your environment. By applying AI models trained on your organization’s behavioral data, UEBA builds dynamic baselines and peer groups, enabling it to spot truly anomalous activity. UBEA builds baselines from 10 days (for uncommon activities) to 6 months, both for the user and their dynamically calculated peers. Then, insights are surfaced on the activities and logs - such as an uncommon activity or first-time activity - not only for the user but among peers. Those insights are used by an advanced AI model to identify high confidence anomalies. So, if a user signs in for the first time from an uncommon location, a common pattern in the environment due to reliance on global vendors, for example, then this will not be identified as an anomaly, keeping the noise down. However, in a tightly controlled environment, this same behavior can be an indication of an attack and will surface in the Anomalies table. Including those signals in custom detections can help affect the severity of an alert. So, while logic is maintained, the SOC is focused on the right priorities. How to use UEBA for maximum impact Security teams can leverage UEBA in several key ways. All the examples below leverage UEBA’s dynamic behavioral baselines looking back up to 6 months. Teams can also leverage the hunting queries from the "UEBA essentials" solution in Microsoft Sentinel's Content Hub. Behavior Analytics: Detect unusual logon times, MFA fatigue, or service principal misuse across hybrid environments. Get visibility into geo-location of events and Threat Intelligence insights. Here’s an example of how you can easily discover Accounts authenticating without MFA and from uncommonly connected countries using UEBA behaviorAnalytics table: BehaviorAnalytics | where TimeGenerated > ago(7d) | where EventSource == "AwsConsoleSignIn" | where ActionType == "ConsoleLogin" and ActivityType == "signin.amazonaws.com" | where ActivityInsights.IsMfaUsed == "No" | where ActivityInsights.CountryUncommonlyConnectedFromInTenant == True | evaluate bag_unpack(UsersInsights, "AWS_") | where InvestigationPriority > 0 // Filter noise - uncomment if you want to see low fidelity noise | project TimeGenerated, _WorkspaceId, ActionType, ActivityType, InvestigationPriority, SourceIPAddress, SourceIPLocation, AWS_UserIdentityType, AWS_UserIdentityAccountId, AWS_UserIdentityArn Anomaly detection Identify lateral movement, dormant account reactivation, or brute-force attempts, even when they span cloud platforms. Below are examples of how to discover UEBA Anomalous AwsCloudTrail anomalies via various UEBA activity insights or device insights attributes: Anomalies | where AnomalyTemplateName in ( "UEBA Anomalous Logon in AwsCloudTrail", // AWS ClousTrail anomalies "UEBA Anomalous MFA Failures in Okta_CL", "UEBA Anomalous Activity in Okta_CL", // Okta Anomalies "UEBA Anomalous Activity in GCP Audit Logs", // GCP Failed IAM access anomalies "UEBA Anomalous Authentication" // For Authentication related anomalies ) | project TimeGenerated, _WorkspaceId, AnomalyTemplateName, AnomalyScore, Description, AnomalyDetails, ActivityInsights, DeviceInsights, UserInsights, Tactics, Techniques Alert optimization Use UEBA signals to dynamically adjust alert severity in custom detections—turning noisy alerts into high-fidelity detections. The example below shows all the users with anomalous sign in patterns based on UEBA. Joining the results with any of the AWS alerts with same AWS identity will increase fidelity. BehaviorAnalytics | where TimeGenerated > ago(7d) | where EventSource == "AwsConsoleSignIn" | where ActionType == "ConsoleLogin" and ActivityType == "signin.amazonaws.com" | where ActivityInsights.FirstTimeConnectionViaISPInTenant == True or ActivityInsights.FirstTimeUserConnectedFromCountry == True | evaluate bag_unpack(UsersInsights, "AWS_") | where InvestigationPriority > 0 // Filter noise - uncomment if you want to see low fidelity noise | project TimeGenerated, _WorkspaceId, ActionType, ActivityType, InvestigationPriority, SourceIPAddress, SourceIPLocation, AWS_UserIdentityType, AWS_UserIdentityAccountId, AWS_UserIdentityArn, ActivityInsights | evaluate bag_unpack(ActivityInsights) Another example shows anomalous key vault access from service principal with uncommon source country location. Joining this activity with other alerts from the same service principle increases fidelity of the alerts. You can also join the anomaly UEBA Anomalous Authentication with other alerts from the same identity to bring the full power of UEBA into your detections. BehaviorAnalytics | where TimeGenerated > ago(1d) | where EventSource == "Authentication" and SourceSystem == "AAD" | evaluate bag_unpack(ActivityInsights) | where LogonMethod == "Service Principal" and Resource == "Azure Key Vault" | where ActionUncommonlyPerformedByUser == "True" and CountryUncommonlyConnectedFromByUser == "True" | where InvestigationPriority > 0 Final thoughts This release marks a new chapter for Sentinel UEBA—bringing together AI, behavioral analytics, and cross-cloud and identity management visibility to help defenders stay ahead of threats. If you haven’t explored UEBA yet, now’s the time. Enable it in your workspace settings and don’t forget to enable anomalies as well (in Anomalies settings). And if you’re already using it, these new sources will help you unlock even more value. Stay tuned for our upcoming Ninja show and webinar (register at aka.ms/secwebinars), where we’ll dive deeper into use cases. Until then, explore the new sources, use the UEBA workbook, update your watchlists, and let UEBA do the heavy lifting. UEBA onboarding and setting documentation Identify threats using UEBA UEBA enrichments and insights reference UEBA anomalies referenceModernize security operations to secure agentic AI—Microsoft Sentinel at Ignite 2025
Security is a core focus at Microsoft Ignite this year, with the Security Forum on November 17, deep dive technical sessions, theater talks, and hands-on labs designed for security leaders and practitioners. Join us in San Francisco, November 17–21, or online, November 18–20, to learn what’s new and what’s next across SecOps, data, cloud, and AI—and how to get more from the Microsoft capabilities you already use. This year, Microsoft Sentinel takes center stage with sessions and labs designed to help you unify data, automate response, and leverage AI-powered insights for faster, more effective threat detection. Featured sessions: BRK235: Power agentic defense with Microsoft Sentinel Explore Microsoft Sentinel’s platform architecture, graph intelligence, and agentic workflows to automate, investigate, and respond with speed and precision. BRK246: Blueprint for building the SOC of the future Learn how to architect a modern SOC that anticipates and prevents threats using predictive shielding, agentic AI, and graph-powered reasoning. LAB543: Perform threat hunting in Microsoft Sentinel Dive deep into advanced threat hunting, KQL queries, and proactive investigation workflows to sharpen your security operations. Explore and filter the full security catalog by topic, format, and role: aka.ms/Ignite/SecuritySessions. Why attend: Ignite is your opportunity to see the latest innovations in Microsoft Sentinel, connect with experts, and gain hands-on experience. Sessions will also touch on future directions for agentic AI and unified SOC operations, as outlined in Microsoft’s broader security roadmap. Security Forum (November 17): Kick off with an immersive, in‑person pre‑day focused on strategic security discussions and real‑world guidance from Microsoft leaders and industry experts. Select Security Forum during registration. Connect with peers and security leaders through these signature security experiences: Security Leaders Dinner—CISOs and VPs connect with Microsoft leaders. CISO Roundtable—Gain practical insights on secure AI adoption. Secure the Night Party—Network in a relaxed, fun setting. Register for Microsoft Ignite >Microsoft Sentinel data lake FAQ
On September 30, 2025, Microsoft announced the general availability of the Microsoft Sentinel data lake, designed to centralize and retain massive volumes of security data in open formats like delta parquet. By decoupling storage from compute, the data lake supports flexible querying, while offering unified data management and cost-effective retention. The Sentinel data lake is a game changer for security teams, serving as the foundational layer for agentic defense, deeper security insights and graph-based enrichment. In this blog we offer answers to many of the questions we’ve heard from our customers and partners. General questions 1. What is the Microsoft Sentinel data lake? Microsoft has expanded its industry-leading SIEM solution, Microsoft Sentinel, to include a unified, security data lake, designed to help optimize costs, simplify data management, and accelerate the adoption of AI in security operations. This modern data lake serves as the foundation for the Microsoft Sentinel platform. It has a cloud-native architecture and is purpose-built for security—bringing together all security data for greater visibility, deeper security analysis and contextual awareness. It provides affordable, long-term retention, allowing organizations to maintain robust security while effectively managing budgetary requirements. 2. What are the benefits of Sentinel data lake? Microsoft Sentinel data lake is designed for flexible analytics, cost management, and deeper security insights. It centralizes security data in an open format like delta parquet for easy access. This unified view enhances threat detection, investigation, and response across hybrid and multi-cloud environments. It introduces a disaggregated storage and compute pricing model, allowing customers to store massive volumes of security data at a fraction of the cost compared to traditional SIEM solutions. It allows multiple analytics engines like Kusto, Spark, and ML to run on a single data copy, simplifying management, reducing costs, and supporting deeper security analysis. It integrates with GitHub Copilot and VS Code empowering SOC teams to automate enrichment, anomaly detection, and forensic analysis. It supports AI agents via the MCP server, allowing tools like GitHub Copilot to query and automate security tasks. The MCP Server layer brings intelligence to the data, offering Semantic Search, Query Tools, and Custom Analysis capabilities that make it easier to extract insights and automate workflows. Customers also benefit from streamlined onboarding, intuitive table management, and scalable multi-tenant support, making it ideal for MSSPs and large enterprises. The Sentinel data lake is purpose built for security workloads, ensuring that processes from ingestion to analytics meet cybersecurity requirements. 3. Is the Sentinel data lake generally available? Yes. The Sentinel data lake is generally available (GA) starting September 30, 2025. To learn more, see GA announcement blog. 4. What happens to Microsoft Sentinel SIEM? Microsoft is expanding Sentinel into an AI powered end-to-end security platform that includes SIEM and new platform capabilities - Security data lake, graph-powered analytics and MCP Server. SIEM remains a core component and will be actively developed and supported. Getting started 1. What are the prerequisites for Sentinel data lake? To get started: Connect your Sentinel workspace to Microsoft Defender prior to onboarding to Sentinel data lake. Once in the Defender experience see data lake onboarding documentation for next steps. Note: Sentinel is moving to the Microsoft Defender portal and the Sentinel Azure portal will be retired by July 2026. 2. I am a Sentinel-only customer, and not a Defender customer, can I use the Sentinel data lake? Yes. You must connect Sentinel to the Defender experience before onboarding to the Sentinel data lake. Microsoft Sentinel is generally available in the Microsoft Defender portal, with or without Microsoft Defender XDR or an E5 license. If you have created a log analytics workspace, enabled it for Sentinel and have the right Microsoft Entra roles (e.g. Global Administrator + Subscription Owner, Security Administrator + Sentinel Contributor), you can enable Sentinel in the Defender portal. For more details on how to connect Sentinel to Defender review these sources: Microsoft Sentinel in the Microsoft Defender portal 3. In what regions is Sentinel data lake available? For supported regions see: Geographical availability and data residency in Microsoft Sentinel | Microsoft Learn 4. Is there an expected release date for Microsoft Sentinel data lake in Government clouds? While the exact date is not yet finalized, we anticipate support for these clouds soon. 5. How will URBAC and Entra RBAC work together to manage the data lake given there is no centralized model? Entra RBAC will provide broad access to the data lake (URBAC maps the right permissions to specific Entra role holders: GA/SA/SO/GR/SR). URBAC will become a centralized pane for configuring non-global delegated access to the data lake. For today, you will use this for the “default data lake” workspace. In the future, this will be enabled for non-default Sentinel workspaces as well – meaning all workspaces in the data lake can be managed here for data lake RBAC requirements. Azure RBAC on the Log Analytics (LA) workspace in the data lake is respected through URBAC as well today. If you already hold a built-in role like log analytics reader, you will be able to run interactive queries over the tables in that workspace. Or, if you hold log analytics contributor, you can read and manage table data. For more details see: Roles and permissions in the Microsoft Sentinel platform | Microsoft Learn Data ingestion and storage 1. How do I ingest data into the Sentinel data lake? To ingest data into the Sentinel data lake, you can use existing Sentinel data connectors or custom connectors to bring data from Microsoft and third-party sources. Data can be ingested into the analytic tier and/or data lake tier. Data ingested into the analytics tier is automatically mirrored to the lake, while lake-only ingestion is available for select tables. Data retention is configured in table management. Note: Certain tables do not support data lake-only ingestion via either API or data connector UI. See here for more information: Custom log tables. 2. What is Microsoft’s guidance on when to use analytics tier vs. the data lake tier? Sentinel data lake offers flexible, built-in data tiering (analytics and data lake tiers) to effectively meet diverse business use cases and achieve cost optimization goals. Analytics tier: Is ideal for high-performance, real-time, end-to-end detections, enrichments, investigation and interactive dashboards. Typically, high-fidelity data from EDRs, email gateways, identity, SaaS and cloud logs, threat intelligence (TI) should be ingested into the analytics tier. Data in the analytics tier is best monitored proactively with scheduled alerts and scheduled analytics to enable security detections Data in this tier is retained at no cost for up to 90 days by default, extendable to 2 years. A copy of the data in this tier is automatically available in the data lake tier at no extra cost, ensuring a unified copy of security data for both tiers. Data lake tier: Is designed for cost-effective, long-term storage. High-volume logs like NetFlow logs, TLS/SSL certificate logs, firewall logs and proxy logs are best suited for data lake tier. Customers can use these logs for historical analysis, compliance and auditing, incident response (IR), forensics over historical data, build tenant baselines, TI matching and then promote resulting insights into the analytics tier. Customers can run full Kusto queries, Spark Notebooks and scheduled jobs over a single copy of their data in the data lake. Customers can also search, enrich and restore data from the data lake tier to the analytics tier for full analytics. For more details see documentation. 3. What does it mean that a copy of all new analytics tier data will be available in the data lake? When Sentinel data lake is enabled, a copy of all new data ingested into the analytics tier is automatically duplicated into the data lake tier. This means customers don’t need to manually configure or manage this process—every new log or telemetry added to the analytics tier becomes instantly available in the data lake. This allows security teams to run advanced analytics, historical investigations, and machine learning models on a single, unified copy of data in the lake, while still using the analytics tier for real-time SOC workflows. It’s a seamless way to support both operational and long-term use cases—without duplicating effort or cost. 4. Is there any cost for retention in the analytics tier? You will get 90 days of analytics retention free. Simply set analytics retention to 90 days or less. Total retention setting – only the mirrored portion that overlaps with the free analytics retention is free in the data lake. Retaining data in the lake beyond the analytics retention period incurs additional storage costs. See documentation for more details: Manage data tiers and retention in Microsoft Sentinel | Microsoft Learn 5. What is the guidance for Microsoft Sentinel Basic and Auxiliary Logs customers? If you previously enabled Basic or Auxiliary Logs plan in Sentinel: You can view Basic Logs in the Defender portal but manage it from the Log Analytics workspace. To manage it in the Defender portal, you must change the plan from Basic to Analytics. Existing Auxiliary Log tables will be available in the data lake tier for use once the Sentinel data lake is enabled. Prior to the availability of Sentinel data lake, Auxiliary Logs provided a long-term retention solution for Sentinel SIEM. Now once the data lake is enabled, Auxiliary Log tables will be available in the Sentinel data lake for use with the data lake experiences. Billing for Auxiliary Logs will switch to Sentinel data lake meters. Microsoft Sentinel customers are recommended to start planning their data management strategy with the data lake. While Basic and auxiliary Logs are still available, they are not being enhanced further. Please plan on onboarding your security data to the Sentinel data lake. Azure Monitor customers can continue to use Basic and Auxiliary Logs for observability scenarios. 6. What happens to customers that already have Archive logs enabled? If a customer has already configured tables for Archive retention, those settings will be inherited by the Sentinel data lake and will not change. Data in the Archive logs will continue to be accessible through Sentinel search and restore experiences. Mirrored data (in the data lake) will be accessible via lake explorer and notebook jobs. Example: If a customer has 12 months of total retention enabled on a table, 2 months after enabling ingestion into the Sentinel data lake, the customer will still have access to 12 months of archived data (through Sentinel search and restore experiences), but access to only 2 months of data in the data lake (since the data lake was enabled). Key considerations for customers that currently have Archive logs enabled: The existing archive will remain, with new data ingested into the data lake going forward; previously stored archive data will not be backfilled into the lake. Archive logs will continue to be accessible via the Search and Restore tab under Sentinel. If analytics and data lake mode are enabled on table, which is the default setting for analytics tables when Sentinel data lake is enabled, data will continue to be ingested into the Sentinel data lake and archive going forward. There will only be one retention billing meter going forward. Archive will continue to be accessible via Search and Restore. If Sentinel data lake-only mode is enabled on table, new data will be ingested only into the data lake; any data that’s not already in the Sentinel data lake won’t be migrated/backfilled. Data that was previously ingested under the archive plan will be accessible via Search and Restore. 7. What is the guidance for customers using Azure Data Explorer (ADX) alongside Microsoft Sentinel? Some customers might have set up ADX cluster to augment their Sentinel deployment. Customers can choose to continue using that setup and gradually migrate to Sentinel data lake for new data to receive the benefits of a fully managed data lake. For all new implementations it is recommended to use the Sentinel data lake. 8. What happens to the Defender XDR data after enabling Sentinel data lake? By default, Defender XDR retains threat hunting data in the XDR default tier, which includes 30 days of analytics retention, which is included in the XDR license. You can extend the table retention period for supported Defender XDR tables beyond 30 days. For more information see Manage XDR data in Microsoft Sentinel. Note: Today you can't ingest XDR tables directly to the data lake tier without ingesting into the analytics tier first. 9. Are there any special considerations for XDR tables? Yes, XDR tables are unique in that they are available for querying in advanced hunting by default for 30 days. To retain data beyond this period, an explicit change to the retention setting is required, either by extending the analytics tier retention or the total retention period. A list of XDR advanced hunting tables supported by Sentinel are documented here: Connect Microsoft Defender XDR data to Microsoft Sentinel | Microsoft Learn. KQL queries and jobs 1. Is KQL and Notebook supported over the Sentinel data lake? Yes, via the data lake KQL query experience along with a fully managed Notebook experience which enables spark-based big data analytics over a single copy of all your security data. Customers can run queries across any time range of data in their Sentinel data lake. In the future, this will be extended to enable SQL query over lake as well. 2. Why are there two different places to run KQL queries in Sentinel experience? Consolidating advanced hunting and KQL Explorer user interfaces is on the roadmap. Security analysts will benefit from unified query experience across both analytics and data lake tiers. 3. Where is the output from KQL jobs stored? KQL jobs are written into existing or new analytics tier table. 4. Is it possible to run KQL queries on multiple data lake tables? Yes, you can run KQL interactive queries and jobs using operators like join or union. 5. Can KQL queries (either interactive or via KQL jobs) join data across multiple workspaces? Yes, security teams can run multi-workspace KQL queries for broader threat correlation. Pricing and billing 1. How does a customer pay for Sentinel data lake? Sentinel data lake is a consumption-based service with disaggregated storage and compute business model. Customers continue to pay for ingestion. Customers set up billing as a part of their onboarding for storage and analytics over data in the data lake (e.g. Queries, KQL or Notebook Jobs). See Sentinel pricing page for more details. 2. What are the pricing components for Sentinel data lake? Sentinel data lake offers a flexible pricing model designed to optimize security coverage and costs. For specific meter definitions, see documentation. 3. What are the billing updates at GA? We are enabling data compression billed with a simple and uniform data compression rate of 6:1 across all data sources, applicable only to data lake storage. Starting October 1, 2025, the data storage billing begins on the first day data is stored. To support ingestion and standardization of diverse data sources, we are introducing a new Data Processing feature that applies a $0.10 per GB charge for all uncompressed data ingested into the data lake for tables configured for data lake only retention. (does not apply to tables configured for both analytic and data lake tier retention). 4. How is retention billed for tables that use data lake-only ingestion & retention? During the public preview, data lake-only tables included the first 30 days of retention at no cost. At GA, storage costs will be billed. In addition, when retention billing switches to using compressed data size (instead of ingested size), this will change, and charges will apply for the entire retention period. Because billing will be based on compressed data size, customers can expect significant savings on storage costs. 5. Does “Data processing” meter apply to analytics tier data duplicated in the data lake? No. 6. What happens to billing for customers that activate Sentinel data lake on a table with archive logs enabled? Customers will automatically be billed using the data lake storage meter. Note: This means that customers will be charged using the 6X compression rate for data lake retention. 7. How do I control my Sentinel data lake costs? Sentinel is billed based on consumption and prices vary based on usage. An important tool in managing the majority of the cost is usage of analytics “Commitment Tiers”. The data lake complements this strategy for higher-volume data like network and firewall data to reduce analytics tier costs. Use the Azure pricing calculator and the Sentinel pricing page to estimate costs and understand pricing. 8. How do I manage Sentinel data lake costs? We are introducing a new cost management experience (public preview) to help customers with cost predictability, billing transparency, and operational efficiency. These in-product reports provide customers with insights into usage trends over time, enabling them to identify cost drivers and optimize data retention and processing strategies. Customers will also be able to set usage-based alerts on specific meters to monitor and control costs. For example, you can receive alerts when query or notebook usage passes set limits, helping avoid unexpected expenses and manage budgets. See documentation to learn more. 9. If I’m an Auxiliary Logs customer, how will onboarding to the Sentinel data lake affect my billing? Once a workspace is onboarded to Sentinel data lake, all Auxiliary Logs meters will be replaced by new data lake meters. Thank you Thank you to our customers and partners for your continued trust and collaboration. Your feedback drives our innovation, and we’re excited to keep evolving Microsoft Sentinel to meet your security needs. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out—we’re here to support you every step of the way.What's new in Microsoft Security Copilot
A major wave of updates has landed: integration with the new Sentinel data lake and graph, new ready-made and custom agents, and the debut of the Microsoft Security Store. Let’s take a look at what’s new. Microsoft Sentinel and Security Copilot integration delivers deeper context and smarter AI Sentinel data lake is now generally available, and new capabilities like Sentinel graph and the Model Context Protocol (MCP) server are in public preview, bringing in a new level of integration with Security Copilot. Agents can now access richer, more connected data from across Sentinel, combining graph, structured, and semantic context to reason and act with greater precision. This enhanced foundation transforms AI-driven detection and response, helping teams resolve incidents faster and uncover deeper insights across their environments. Read more in the Sentinel announcement blog: Introducing Microsoft Sentinel graph Build your own Security Copilot agents, no coding required Now anyone on your team can create custom Security Copilot agents. Use a no-code portal or developer tools to design, test, and deploy agents that automate the workflows you need most. Your team controls how they work and what they do. Learn more: Build your own Security Copilot agent New Microsoft and partner ready-made agents for real challenges These new agents help teams address common security and IT challenges faster and smarter: Access Review Agent in Microsoft Entra: Streamline access reviews, flag unusual patterns, and reduce fatigue for security and compliance teams. It helps maintain governance and compliance by automatically analyzing ongoing access reviews and highlighting potential risks. o Learn more: The Microsoft Entra agent for smarter access governance: Access Review Agent Phishing Triage Agent in Microsoft Defender saves nearly 200 hours a month: In this new customer spotlight, St. Luke’s is seeing the impact of integrating Security Copilot agents into their daily workflows. ACISO Krista Arndt says, “The Phishing Triage Agent is a game changer. It’s saving us nearly 200 hours monthly by autonomously handling and closing thousands of false positive alerts.” With routine triage automated, security teams can shift from reactive response to proactive threat hunting, freeing up time for higher-value work and faster threat mitigation. The launch of 30 new partner-built agents that can be found on the Microsoft Security Store with solutions like: Forensic Agent by glueckkanja AG: Delivers deep-dive analysis of Defender XDR incidents to accelerate investigations and uncover root causes faster. Privileged Admin Watchdog Agent by glueckkanja AG: Helps enforce zero standing privilege principles by removing persistent admin identities, reducing risk, and strengthening administrative security. Ransomware Kill Chain Investigator Agent by adaQuest: Automates ransomware triage to quickly detect and respond to threats, enabling security teams to focus on high-priority incidents. Entity Guard Investigator Agent by adaQuest: Investigates Defender incidents and provides actionable insights to accelerate incident resolution and strengthen security posture. Admin Guard Insight Agent by adaQuest: Analyzes administrative activity, detects anomalies, evaluates risk exposure and compliance, and delivers actionable guidance to improve administrative security. Identity Workload ID Agent by Invoke: Empowers identity administrators and security teams to manage and secure Workload Identities in Microsoft Entra, reducing risk, strengthening compliance, and controlling identity sprawl. o Find these agents and more in the Microsoft Security Store Microsoft Security Store – one, centralized place to find agents and SaaS solutions The Microsoft Security Store makes it simple to discover, deploy, and buy Security Copilot agents and partner solutions. Start using any of the 30 new agents or 50 SaaS solutions to power your SOC, IT, privacy, and compliance workflows. Read more in the announcement blog: Introducing Microsoft Security Store Stay tuned and explore more! Security Copilot is transforming how security and IT teams operate – bringing AI-powered insights, automation, and decision support into everyday workflows. With new capabilities landing every month, the pace of innovation is accelerating. We’ll be back in November with more updates. Until then, explore these resources to get hands-on, deepen your understanding, and see what’s possible: Security Copilot Video Hub – Watch demos and walkthroughs to see Security Copilot in action Microsoft Security Copilot Website – Learn about capabilities, use cases, and product details Security Copilot Adoption Hub – Access rollout guides, templates, and best practices Don’t miss Microsoft Ignite - we’ll be announcing exciting new capabilities for Security Copilot and sharing what’s next in AI-powered security.
Revolutionizing log collection with Azure Monitor Agent
The much awaited deprecation of the MMA agent is finally here. While still sunsetting, this blog post reviews the advantages of AMA, different deployment options and important updates to your favorite Windows, Syslog and CEF events via AMA data connectors.From idea to Security Copilot agent: Create, customize, and deploy
This week at Microsoft Secure, we announced the next big step forward in agentic security. In addition to Microsoft and partner-built agents, you can now create your own Security Copilot agents, extending the growing ecosystem of agents that help teams automate workflows, close gaps, and drive stronger security and IT outcomes. Why it matters: no two environments are the same. Out-of-the-box agents give you powerful starting points, but your workflows are unique. With custom agents, you get the flexibility to design and deploy solutions that fit your organization. Two ways to build: Your choice, your workflow Security Copilot gives you options. Analysts can easily build with a no-code interface. Developers can stay in their preferred coding environment. Either way, you end up with a fully functional, testable, and deployable agent. For full documentation and detailed guidance on building agents, check out the Microsoft Security Copilot documentation. But now, let’s walk through the key steps so you can get started building your own agent today. Option 1: Build in Security Copilot, no coding required Step 1: Create in natural language Click ‘Build’ in the left nav, describe what you want your agent to do in plain language, and submit. Security Copilot will engage in a back-and-forth conversation to clarify and capture your intent so you start with precision. Step 2: Auto-generate the configuration Security Copilot instantly creates a starter setup, giving you: An agent name and description Clear instructions and input parameters Recommended tools pulled from the catalog, including Microsoft, partner, and Sentinel MCP tools This saves time and generates a strong foundation you can build on Step 3: Customize to fit your needs Tailor the configuration to your needs, you can edit any part. Update instructions, swap tools, or add new ones from the tool catalog. If the right tool isn’t available, you can create one in natural language or a form-based experience. You’re in full control of how your agent works. Step 4: Keep YAML and no-code views aligned Every change you make is automatically reflected in the underlying YAML code. This ensures consistency between the no-code visual and code views, so both analysts and developers can work with confidence. Toggle on ‘view code’ to see it live. Step 5: Test and elevate with autotune instruction optimization Run full end-to-end tests or test individual components to see how your agent performs. Security Copilot shows detailed outputs and a step-by-step activity map of the agent’s dynamic plan, including the tools, inputs, and outputs. While you can test without it, turning on autotune instruction optimization delivers major advantages: Refined instruction recommendations you can copy directly into your config AI quality scoring on clarity, grounding, and detail to ensure your agent is effective before publishing Faster iteration with confidence your agent is tuned for real-world use Explore the activity graph tab to view a visual node map of the run, and click any node to see details of what happened at each step. Step 6: Publish and share When you’re ready, publish the agent into your Security Copilot instance at either a user or workspace scope (depending on admin permissions). If you’re a partner, you can also download the agent code, publish to the Microsoft Partner Center and contribute it to the Microsoft Security Store for broader visibility and adoption by customers. Benefit: Build production-ready agents in minutes without writing a single line of code. It’s that easy to build an agent tailored to your unique workflows, and you are not limited to the Security Copilot portal. If you prefer a developer-friendly environment, you can build entirely in VS Code using GitHub Copilot and Microsoft Sentinel MCP tools. You still get AI-powered guidance, YAML scaffolding, and testing support, along with rich context from Sentinel data and the full platform toolset, all while staying in the environment that works best for you. Option 2: Build in VS Code using GitHub Copilot + Microsoft Sentinel MCP Tools Step 1: Set up your development environment Enable the Microsoft Sentinel MCP server in VS Code. This gives you direct access to the collection of Security Copilot agent creation MCP tools and integrates with GitHub Copilot for code generation – all while staying in your preferred workspace. Step 2: Define agent behavior from natural language with platform context Describe the agent you want to build in natural language. GitHub Copilot interprets your intent, selects the relevant MCP tools, find relevant skills and tools in Security Copilot for your agent, and crafts the agent instructions. The agent YAML gets generated and outputted back to you. Because your agent is built on Microsoft Security Copilot and Sentinel, it automatically leverages rich data and tooling across the platform for context-aware, more effective results. Step 3: Iterate, customize and extend your agent Modify instructions, add tools, or create new tools as needed. Use prompts to vibe code your edits or copy the YAML into the code editor and directly modify the agent YAML there. GitHub Copilot keeps the chat and code in sync. Step 4: Deploy to Security Copilot for testing Once you’re ready to test your agent YAML, prompt GitHub Copilot to deploy the agent to your user scope. Then head to the Security Copilot portal to test and optimize your agent with autotune instruction optimization. Take advantage of detailed outputs, activity maps, and AI scoring to refine instructions and ensure your agent performs effectively in real-world scenarios. Step 5: Publish and share your agent Once validated, publish the agent into your Security Copilot instance at either user or workspace scope (depending on admin permissions). Partners can also download the agent code, publish to the Microsoft Partner Center, and contribute it to the Microsoft Security Store for broader discoverability and adoption. What you get: Full code-level control and the same AI-powered agent development experience while staying in your preferred workspace. Whichever approach you choose, you can build, test, and deploy agents that fit your workflows and environment. Microsoft Security Copilot and Microsoft Sentinel give you the tools and advanced AI guidance to create agents that work for your organization. Explore the Microsoft Security Store Automate your workflows with pre-built solutions. The Microsoft Security Store gives you a central place to discover and deploy agents and SaaS solutions created by Microsoft and partners. Browse ready-to-use solutions, learn from proven approaches, and adapt them with your own customizations. It’s the quickest way to expand your ecosystem of agents and accelerate impact. More resources about the Security Store: What is Security Store? Microsoft Learn Build, deploy, defend Security Copilot puts the power of agentic AI directly in your hands. Start with ready-to-use agents from Microsoft and partners, or create custom agents designed specifically for your environment and workflows. These agents streamline decision-making, surface critical insights, and free your team to focus on strategic security initiatives - making operations faster, smarter, and more responsive. Join us at Microsoft Ignite, online or in-person, for hands-on demos and insights on how Security Copilot agents empower teams to act faster and protect better. More resources on building Security Copilot agents: Watch the Mechanics video to see agents in action: Security Copilot agents Mechanics video For more detailed guidance on building agents, check out the Microsoft Security Copilot documentation Special thanks to my co-authors, Namrata Puri (Principal PM, Security Copilot) and Sherie Pan (PM, Security Copilot), for their insights and contributionsAgentic security your way: Build your own Security Copilot agents
Microsoft Security Copilot is redefining how security and IT teams operate. Today at Microsoft Secure, we’re unveiling powerful updates that put genAI and agent-driven automation at the center of modern defense. In a world where threats move faster than ever, alerts pile up, and resources stay tight, Security Copilot delivers the competitive edge: contextual intelligence, a growing network of agents, and the flexibility to build your own. The announcements focus on three key areas: building your own Security Copilot agents for tailored workflows, expanding the agent ecosystem with new Microsoft and partner solutions, and improving agent quality and performance. These updates build on the agents first introduced in March while giving security and IT teams more flexibility and control. This is the blueprint for the next era of agentic defense, and it starts now. Build your own Security Copilot agents, your way While we already offer a growing catalog of ready-to-use agents built by Microsoft and partners, we know that no two environments are alike. That’s why Security Copilot empowers you to create custom agents your way for tailored workflows – whether you're an analyst with limited coding experience or a developer using your favorite platform – you can build agents that fit your needs. Build agents in the Security Copilot portal Users can now build agents with a simplified, no-code interface in the standalone Security Copilot experience. Simply describe the task or workflow in natural language, and Copilot automatically generates the agent code. You can edit components, add any additional tools, including Sentinel MCP tools from our rich tool catalog, test the agent, optimize its instructions, and publish directly to your tenant. Create dynamic, ready-to-use agents in minutes – without writing any code. Build agents in a preferred MCP server-enabled development environment For teams with experienced developers, you can also use natural language and vibe-coding to build agents in a preferred MCP server-enabled coding platform, such as VS Code using GitHub Copilot. By enabling the Sentinel MCP server, developers can access MCP tools to build, refine, and deploy custom agents directly within their workspace. This approach gives full control over code, tools, and deployment while keeping the process within familiar development platforms. These options empower both technical and non-technical teams to rapidly create, test, and deploy custom Security Copilot agents. Organizations can automate workflows faster, design agents to their unique needs, and improve security and IT operations across the board. Discover new Security Copilot agents Since Security Copilot agents were first introduced in March, we have delivered more than a dozen Microsoft and partner-developed agents that help organizations tackle real challenges in security and IT operations. Analysts using the Conditional Access Optimization Agent in Microsoft Entra have been able to quickly uncover policy gaps, closing an average of 26 gaps per customer in just one month, with 73% of early adopters acting on at least one recommendation. The Phishing Triage Agent in Microsoft Defender has allowed analysts to shift from reactive sifting to proactive resolution, reducing triage time by up to 78%. Read how St Lukes University saves nearly 200 hours monthly in phishing alert triage and creating incident reports in minutes instead of hours. The Phishing Triage Agent is a game changer. It’s saving us nearly 200 hours monthly by autonomously handling and closing thousands of false positive alerts. - Krista Arndt, ACISO, St. Luke’s University Health Network We’re continuing to build on this momentum with new agents designed to address additional security and IT scenarios. The new Access Review Agent in Microsoft Entra tackles a common challenge: reduce access review fatigue and approving access without review. It analyzes ongoing reviews, flags anomalies or unusual access patterns, and delivers actionable guidance in a conversational interface. Reviewers can approve, revoke, or request more details right in Microsoft Teams, helping them focus on the riskiest access, make faster decisions, and strengthen compliance. With innovations like this, we’re not just reducing fatigue—we’re redefining how access governance is done, setting the standard for security agents that adapt to the way people work. Learn more about the Access Review Agent here. And, with the growing range of agentic use cases, the new Microsoft Security Store is your one-stop shop to discover, purchase, and deploy Security Copilot agents built by Microsoft and trusted partners. Find solutions aligned for SOC, IT, privacy, compliance, and governance teams, all in one place. By uniting discovery, deployment, and publishing in a single experience, Security Store powers a thriving ecosystem that gives your team a unique advantage: access to an ever-expanding range of agent capabilities that evolve as fast as the challenges they face. In addition to helping customers find the right solutions, Security Store also enables partners to bring their innovations to market. Partners can build and publish Security Copilot agents and SaaS solutions to grow their business and reach new customers. Today, we are announcing 30 new partner-built agents as well as 50 partner SaaS solutions in the Security Store. The launch of 30 new partner-built agents brings forward solutions like: A Forensic Agent by glueckkanja AG delivers deep-dive analysis of Defender XDR incidents to accelerate investigations, while their Privileged Admin Watchdog Agent helps enforce zero standing privilege principles by getting rid of persistent admin identities. These innovations, along with their other 6 agents in the Security Store today, demonstrate how glueckkanja AG is empowering organizations to tackle a wide range of security and IT challenges. 3 agents from adaQuest focused on automating investigation and response to focus security teams on what matters. A Ransomware Kill Chain Investigator Agent by adaQuest automates ransomware triage, an Entity Guard Investigator Agent by adaQuest investigates Defender incidents, and an Admin Guard Insight Agent analyzes administrative activity, detects anomalies, evaluates risk exposure and compliance, offering actionable insights to improve administrative security posture. An Identity Workload ID Agent by Invoke empowers identity administrators and security teams to manage and secure Workload Identities in Microsoft Entra, helping to reduce risk, strengthen compliance, provide more control over identity sprawl. To learn more about all new partner-built agents as well as partner SaaS offerings, read the blog or head to the Microsoft Security Store. Smarter, faster Security Copilot agents High-quality LLM instructions are critical to agent performance, yet manually fine-tuning them is time-consuming and error-prone. We’re excited to introduce tools that help improve custom-built agent quality and performance, starting with autotune instruction optimization. Autotune eliminates the need for manual tuning by automatically analyzing and refining agent instructions for optimal performance. Simply enable autotune during testing and submit, then receive a detailed results report with suggested prompt changes boost your agent’s AI quality score quickly and effortlessly. This optimization not only delivers better outcomes faster, but it also ensures that every agent in our ecosystem is always evolving - making them smarter, sharper, and more effective over time. But instructions are only part of the picture. To truly empower agents, context and data is key. By combining rich security signals from Microsoft Sentinel with advanced AI reasoning, Microsoft is setting a new standard for what agents can achieve—resolving incidents faster, optimizing workflows, and delivering deeper, more actionable insight. Security Copilot leverages a unified foundation of structured, graph, and semantic data from Sentinel to give agents the context they need to connect the dots across your environment. This deep integration transforms what AI can do, enabling agents to reason, adapt, and act with precision at machine speed. Read the Sentinel graph announcement here. Get Started Today With Security Copilot, the power of AI is now in your hands. Deploy ready-to-use agents from Microsoft and partners, or design custom agents built for your environment and workflows. These agents accelerate decision-making, surface critical insights, and let teams focus on strategic security work - turning complexity into clarity and speed. Explore Security Store today to experience how agentic automation is reshaping security operations and unlocking the full potential of your team. Learn more about how to create your own agents. Deep dive into these innovations at Microsoft Secure on Sept. 30, Oct. 1 or on demand. Then, join us at Microsoft Ignite, Nov, 17–21 in San Francisco, CA or online—for more innovations, hands-on labs, and expert connections.
Unified SecOps XDR
Hi, I am reaching out to community to seek understanding regarding Unified SecOps XDR portal for Multi-tenant Multi-workspace. Our organization already has a Azure lighthouse setup. My question is if M365 lighthouse license also required for the Multi-tenant Multi-workspace in unified SecOps XDR portal?Table Talk: Sentinel’s New ThreatIntel Tables Explained
Key updates On April 3, 2025, we publicly previewed two new tables to support STIX (Structured Threat Information eXpression) indicator and object schemas: ThreatIntelIndicators and ThreatIntelObjects. To summarize the important dates: 31 August 2025: We previously announced that data ingestion into the legacy ThreatIntelligenceIndicator table would cease on the 31 July 2025. This timeline has now been extended and the transition to the new ThreatIntelIndicators and ThreatIntelObjects tables will proceed gradually until the 31 st of August 2025. The legacy ThreatIntelligenceIndicator table (and its data) will remain accessible, but no new data will be ingested there. Therefore, any custom content, such as workbooks, queries, or analytic rules, must be updated to reference the new tables to remain effective. If you require additional time to complete the transition, you may opt into dual ingestion, available until the official retirement on the 21 st of May 2026, by submitting a service request. Update: The opt in to dual ingestion ended on the 31 st of August and is no longer available. 31 May 2026: ThreatIntelligenceIndicator table support will officially retire, along with ingestion for those who opt-in to dual ingestion beyond 31 st of August 2025. What’s changing: ThreatIntelligenceIndicator VS ThreatIntelIndicators and ThreatIntelObjects Let’s summarise some of the differences. ThreatIntelligenceIndicator ThreatIntelIndicators ThreatIntelObjects Status Extended data ingestion until the 31st of August 2025, opt-in for additional transition time available. Deprecating on the 31st of May 2026 — no new data will be ingested after this date. Active and recommended for use. Active and complementary to ThreatIntelIndicators. Purpose Originally used to store threat indicators like IPs, domains, file hashes, etc. Stores individual threat indicators (e.g. IPs, URLs, file hashes). Stores STIX objects that provide contextual information about indicators. Examples: threat actors, malware families, campaigns, attack patterns. Characteristics Limitations: o Less flexible schema. o Limited support for STIX (Structured Threat Information eXpression) objects. o Fewer contextual fields for advanced threat hunting. Enhancements: o Supports STIX indicator schema. o Includes a Data column with full STIX object data for advanced hunting. o More metadata fields (e.g. LastUpdateMethod, IsDeleted, ExpirationDateTime). o Optimized ingestion: excludes empty key-value pairs and truncates long fields over 1,000 characters. Enhancements: o Enables richer threat modelling and correlation. o Includes fields like StixType, Data.name, and Data.id. Use cases Legacy structure for storing threat indicators. Migration Note: All custom queries, workbooks, and analytics rules referencing this table must be updated to use the new tables . Ideal for identifying and correlating specific threat indicators. Threat Hunting: Enables hunting for specific Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) such as IP addresses, domains, URLs, and file hashes. Alerting and detection rules: Can be used in KQL queries to match against telemetry from other tables (e.g. Heartbeat, SecurityEvent, Syslog). Example query correlating threat indictors with threat actors: Identify threat actors associated with specific threat indicators Useful for understanding relationships between indicators and broader threat entities (e.g. linking an IP to a known threat actor). Threat Hunting: Adds context by linking indicators to threat actors, malware families, campaigns, and attack patterns. Alerting and Detection rules: Enrich alerts with context like threat actor names or malware types. Example query listing TI objects related to a threat actor, “Sangria Tempest.” : List threat intelligence data related to a specific threat actor Benefits of the new ThreatIntelIndicators and ThreatIntelObjects tables In addition to what’s mentioned in the table above. The main benefits of the new table include: Enhanced Threat Visibility More granular and complete representation of threat intelligence. Support for advanced hunting scenarios and complex queries. Enables attribution to threat actors and relationships. Improved Hunting Capabilities Generic parsing of STIX patterns. Support for all valid STIX IoCs, Threat Actors, Identity, and Relationships. Important considerations with the new TI tables Higher volume of data being ingested: o In the legacy ThreatIntelligenceIndicator table, only the IoCs with Domain, File, URL, Email, Network sources were ingested. o The new tables support a richer schema and more detailed data, which naturally increases ingestion volume. The Data column in both tables stores full STIX objects, which are often large and complex. o Additional metadata fields (e.g. LastUpdateMethod, StixType, ObservableKey, etc.) increase the size of each record. o Some fields like description and pattern are truncated if they exceed 1,000 characters, indicating the potential for large payloads. More Frequent Republishing: o Previously, threat intelligence data was republished over a 12-day cycle. Now, all data is republished every 7-10 days (depending on the volume), increasing the ingestion frequency and volume. o This change ensures fresher data but also leads to more frequent ingestion events. o Republishing is identifiable by LastUpdateMethod = "LogARepublisher" in the tables. Optimising data ingestion There are two mechanisms to optimise threat intelligence data ingestion and control costs. Ingestion Rules See ingestion rules in action: Introducing Threat Intelligence Ingestion Rules | Microsoft Community Hub Sentinel supports Ingestion Rules that allow organizations to curate data before it enters the system. In addition, it enables: Bulk tagging, expiration extensions, and confidence-based filtering, which may increase ingestion if more indicators are retained or extended. Custom workflows that may result in additional ingestion events (e.g. tagging or relationship creation). Reduce noise by filtering out irrelevant TI Objects such as low confidence indicators (e.g. drop IoCs with a confidence score of 0), suppressing known false positives from specific feeds. These rules act on TI objects before they are ingested into Sentinel, giving you control over what gets stored and analysed. Data Collection Rules/ Data transformation As mentioned above, the ThreatIntelIndicator and ThreatIntelObjects tables include a “Data” column which contains the full original STIX object and may or may not be relevant for your use cases. In this case, you can use a workspace transformation DCR to filter it out using a KQL query. An example of this KQL query is shown below, for more examples about using workspace transformations and data collection rules: Data collection rules in Azure Monitor - Azure Monitor | Microsoft Learn source | project-away Data A few things to note: o Your threat intelligence feeds will be sending the additional STIX objects data and IoCs, if you prefer not to receive these additional TI data, you can modify the filter out data according to your use cases as mentioned above. More examples are mentioned here: Work with STIX objects and indicators to enhance threat intelligence and threat hunting in Microsoft Sentinel (Preview) - Microsoft Sentinel | Microsoft Learn o If you are using a data collection rule to make schema changes such as dropping the fields, please make sure to modify the relevant Sentinel content (e.g. detection rules, Workbooks, hunting queries, etc.) that are using the tables. o There can be additional cost when using Azure Monitor data transformations (such as when adding extra columns or adding enrichments to incoming data), however, if Sentinel is enabled on the Log Analytics workspace, there is no filtering ingestion charge regardless of how much data the transformation filters. New Threat Intelligence solution pack available A new Threat Intelligence solution is now available in the Content Hub, providing out of the box content referencing the new TI tables, including 51 detection rules, 5 hunting queries, 1 Workbook, 5 data connectors and also includes 1 parser for the ThreatIntelIndicators. Please note, the previous Threat Intelligence solution pack will be deprecated and removed after the transition phase. We recommend downloading the new solution from the Content Hub as shown below: Conclusion The transition to the new ThreatIntelIndicators and ThreatIntelObjects tables provide enhanced support for STIX schemas, improved hunting and alerting features, and greater control over data ingestion allowing organizations to get deeper visibility and more effective threat detection. To ensure continuity and maximize value, it's essential to update existing content and adopt the new Threat Intelligence solution pack available in the Content Hub. Related content and references: Work with STIX objects and indicators to enhance threat intelligence and threat hunting in Microsoft Sentinel Curate Threat Intelligence using Ingestion Rules Announcing Public Preview: New STIX Objects in Microsoft Sentinel
