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[7.16] [7.17] Add correlation section to audit logging docs (#123757) (#123830) #123831

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[7.16] [7.17] Add correlation section to audit logging docs (#123757) (#123830) #123831

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57 changes: 54 additions & 3 deletions docs/user/security/audit-logging.asciidoc
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Expand Up @@ -55,8 +55,9 @@ For information on how to configure `xpack.security.audit.appender`, refer to

Refer to the table of events that can be logged for auditing purposes.

Each event is broken down into <<field-event-category, category>>, <<field-event-type, type>>, <<field-event-action, action>> and <<field-event-outcome, outcome>> fields
to make it easy to filter, query and aggregate the resulting logs.
Each event is broken down into <<field-event-category, category>>, <<field-event-type, type>>, <<field-event-action, action>> and
<<field-event-outcome, outcome>> fields to make it easy to filter, query and aggregate the resulting logs. The <<field-trace-id, trace.id>>
field can be used to correlate multiple events that originate from the same request.

Refer to <<xpack-security-ecs-audit-schema>> for a table of fields that get logged with audit event.

Expand Down Expand Up @@ -448,7 +449,57 @@ Example: `https`
| *Field*
| *Description*

| `trace.id`
| [[field-trace-id]] `trace.id`
| Unique identifier allowing events of the same transaction from {kib} and {es} to be be correlated.

|======

[[xpack-security-ecs-audit-correlation]]
==== Correlating ECS audit events

Audit events can be correlated in two ways:

1. Multiple {kib} audit events that resulted from the same request can be correlated together.
2. If {ref}/enable-audit-logging.html[{es} audit logging] is enabled, {kib} audit events from one request can be correlated with backend
calls that create {es} audit events.

NOTE: The examples below are simplified, many fields have been omitted and values have been shortened for clarity.

===== Example 1: correlating multiple {kib} audit events

When "thom" creates a new alerting rule, five audit events are written:

[source,json]
-------------
{"event":{"action":"http_request","category":["web"],"outcome":"unknown"},"http":{"request":{"method":"post"}},"url":{"domain":"localhost","path":"/api/alerting/rule","port":5601,"scheme":"https"},"user":{"name":"thom","roles":["superuser"]},"kibana":{"space_id":"default","session_id":"3dHCZRB..."},"@timestamp":"2022-01-25T13:05:34.449-05:00","message":"User is requesting [/api/alerting/rule] endpoint","trace":{"id":"e300e06..."}}
{"event":{"action":"space_get","category":["database"],"type":["access"],"outcome":"success"},"kibana":{"space_id":"default","session_id":"3dHCZRB...","saved_object":{"type":"space","id":"default"}},"user":{"name":"thom","roles":["superuser"]},"@timestamp":"2022-01-25T13:05:34.454-05:00","message":"User has accessed space [id=default]","trace":{"id":"e300e06..."}}
{"event":{"action":"connector_get","category":["database"],"type":["access"],"outcome":"success"},"kibana":{"space_id":"default","session_id":"3dHCZRB...","saved_object":{"type":"action","id":"5e3b1ae..."}},"user":{"name":"thom","roles":["superuser"]},"@timestamp":"2022-01-25T13:05:34.948-05:00","message":"User has accessed connector [id=5e3b1ae...]","trace":{"id":"e300e06..."}}
{"event":{"action":"connector_get","category":["database"],"type":["access"],"outcome":"success"},"kibana":{"space_id":"default","session_id":"3dHCZRB...","saved_object":{"type":"action","id":"5e3b1ae..."}},"user":{"name":"thom","roles":["superuser"]},"@timestamp":"2022-01-25T13:05:34.956-05:00","message":"User has accessed connector [id=5e3b1ae...]","trace":{"id":"e300e06..."}}
{"event":{"action":"rule_create","category":["database"],"type":["creation"],"outcome":"unknown"},"kibana":{"space_id":"default","session_id":"3dHCZRB...","saved_object":{"type":"alert","id":"64517c3..."}},"user":{"name":"thom","roles":["superuser"]},"@timestamp":"2022-01-25T13:05:34.956-05:00","message":"User is creating rule [id=64517c3...]","trace":{"id":"e300e06..."}}
-------------

All of these audit events can be correlated together by the same `trace.id` value `"e300e06..."`. The first event is the HTTP API call, the
next audit events are checks to validate the space and the connectors, and the last audit event is the actual rule creation.

===== Example 2: correlating a {kib} audit event with {es} audit events

When "thom" logs in, a "user_login" {kib} audit event is written:

[source,json]
-------------
{"event":{"action":"user_login","category":["authentication"],"outcome":"success"},"user":{"name":"thom","roles":["superuser"]},"@timestamp":"2022-01-25T09:40:39.267-05:00","message":"User [thom] has logged in using basic provider [name=basic]","trace":{"id":"818cbf3..."}}
-------------

The `trace.id` value `"818cbf3..."` in the {kib} audit event can be correlated with the `opaque_id` value in these six {es} audit events:

[source,json]
-------------
{"type":"audit", "timestamp":"2022-01-25T09:40:38,604-0500", "event.action":"access_granted", "user.name":"thom", "user.roles":["superuser"], "request.id":"YCx8wxs...", "action":"cluster:admin/xpack/security/user/authenticate", "request.name":"AuthenticateRequest", "opaque_id":"818cbf3..."}
{"type":"audit", "timestamp":"2022-01-25T09:40:38,613-0500", "event.action":"access_granted", "user.name":"kibana_system", "user.roles":["kibana_system"], "request.id":"Ksx73Ad...", "action":"indices:data/write/index", "request.name":"IndexRequest", "indices":[".kibana_security_session_1"], "opaque_id":"818cbf3..."}
{"type":"audit", "timestamp":"2022-01-25T09:40:38,613-0500", "event.action":"access_granted", "user.name":"kibana_system", "user.roles":["kibana_system"], "request.id":"Ksx73Ad...", "action":"indices:data/write/bulk", "request.name":"BulkRequest", "opaque_id":"818cbf3..."}
{"type":"audit", "timestamp":"2022-01-25T09:40:38,613-0500", "event.action":"access_granted", "user.name":"kibana_system", "user.roles":["kibana_system"], "request.id":"Ksx73Ad...", "action":"indices:data/write/bulk[s]", "request.name":"BulkShardRequest", "indices":[".kibana_security_session_1"], "opaque_id":"818cbf3..."}
{"type":"audit", "timestamp":"2022-01-25T09:40:38,613-0500", "event.action":"access_granted", "user.name":"kibana_system", "user.roles":["kibana_system"], "request.id":"Ksx73Ad...", "action":"indices:data/write/index:op_type/create", "request.name":"BulkItemRequest", "indices":[".kibana_security_session_1"], "opaque_id":"818cbf3..."}
{"type":"audit", "timestamp":"2022-01-25T09:40:38,613-0500", "event.action":"access_granted", "user.name":"kibana_system", "user.roles":["kibana_system"], "request.id":"Ksx73Ad...", "action":"indices:data/write/bulk[s][p]", "request.name":"BulkShardRequest", "indices":[".kibana_security_session_1"], "opaque_id":"818cbf3..."}
-------------

The {es} audit events show that "thom" authenticated, then subsequently "kibana_system" created a session for that user.