Google Workspace Admin Role Assigned to a User
editGoogle Workspace Admin Role Assigned to a User
editAssigning the administrative role to a user will grant them access to the Google Admin console and grant them administrator privileges which allow them to access and manage various resources and applications. An adversary may create a new administrator account for persistence or apply the admin role to an existing user to carry out further intrusion efforts. Users with super-admin privileges can bypass single-sign on if enabled in Google Workspace.
Rule type: query
Rule indices:
- filebeat-*
- logs-google_workspace*
Severity: high
Risk score: 73
Runs every: 10 minutes
Searches indices from: now-130m (Date Math format, see also Additional look-back time
)
Maximum alerts per execution: 100
References:
Tags:
- Elastic
- Cloud
- Google Workspace
- Continuous Monitoring
- SecOps
- Identity and Access
- Persistence
Version: 102 (version history)
Added (Elastic Stack release): 7.11.0
Last modified (Elastic Stack release): 8.6.0
Rule authors: Elastic
Rule license: Elastic License v2
Potential false positives
editGoogle Workspace admin role assignments may be modified by system administrators. Verify that the configuration change was expected. Exceptions can be added to this rule to filter expected behavior.
Investigation guide
edit### Important Information Regarding Google Workspace Event Lag Times - As per Google's documentation, Google Workspace administrators may observe lag times ranging from minutes up to 3 days between the time of an event's occurrence and the event being visible in the Google Workspace admin/audit logs. - This rule is configured to run every 10 minutes with a lookback time of 130 minutes. - To reduce the risk of false negatives, consider reducing the interval that the Google Workspace (formerly G Suite) Filebeat module polls Google's reporting API for new events. - By default, `var.interval` is set to 2 hours (2h). Consider changing this interval to a lower value, such as 10 minutes (10m). - See the following references for further information: - https://support.google.com/a/answer/7061566 - https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/beats/filebeat/current/filebeat-module-google_workspace.html
Rule query
editevent.dataset:"google_workspace.admin" and event.category:"iam" and event.action:"ASSIGN_ROLE" and google_workspace.event.type:"DELEGATED_ADMIN_SETTINGS" and google_workspace.admin.role.name : *_ADMIN_ROLE
Threat mapping
editFramework: MITRE ATT&CKTM
-
Tactic:
- Name: Persistence
- ID: TA0003
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0003/
-
Technique:
- Name: Account Manipulation
- ID: T1098
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1098/
Rule version history
edit- Version 102 (8.6.0 release)
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- Formatting only
- Version 101 (8.5.0 release)
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-
Updated query, changed from:
event.dataset:google_workspace.admin and event.provider:admin and event.category:iam and event.action:ASSIGN_ROLE
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- Version 14 (8.4.0 release)
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- Formatting only
- Version 12 (8.3.0 release)
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- Formatting only
- Version 10 (8.2.0 release)
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- Formatting only
- Version 6 (8.0.0 release)
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-
Updated query, changed from:
event.dataset:(gsuite.admin or google_workspace.admin) and event.provider:admin and event.category:iam and event.action:ASSIGN_ROLE
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- Version 5 (7.15.0 release)
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- Formatting only
- Version 4 (7.13.0 release)
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- Formatting only
- Version 3 (7.12.0 release)
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- Formatting only
- Version 2 (7.11.2 release)
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- Formatting only