Sometimes the simplest things are what save the day—and when it comes to cybersecurity, that’s more common than you might think.
Event logs are like your personal private detective, working tirelessly 24/7/365 to record everything happening in your systems—and when we say everything, we mean everything.
Why is this a good thing? Because thanks to this exhaustive monitoring, you’ll be able to quickly spot any vulnerability or security breach in your company and take the necessary steps to mitigate it.
As your trusted IT service provider, we’re here to walk you through how event logging works and share the best practices for protecting your business network.
What Is Event Logging?
Event logging is the act of tracking all events that happen within your IT systems. “Event” can be many different things, such as:
- Login attempts
- File access
- Software installs
- Network traffic
- Denial of access
- System changes
- And many others
This means that all activities are recorded with a timestamp to give you a complete view of what’s happening in your IT ecosystem. Thanks to this, it’s possible to detect threats before they turn into real problems for your business.
Why is it critical to track and log all these events?
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Detect suspicious activity by tracking user behavior and system events.
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Quickly respond to incidences by creating a clear, record of what took place in a breach.
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Comply with regulations that require businesses to accurately record activities associated with their systems.
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Best Practices for Effective Event Logging
Like everything when it comes to using technology (and life in general), if you use it properly, activity logging can bring you a lot of benefits. Let’s take a look at some recommended best practices that are very useful to help you get the most out of this strategy.
Log What Matters Most
I know we said that event logging records EVERYTHING—but there’s no need to take it that literally. The truth is, you don’t need to log every single digital footprint; otherwise, you’ll end up generating so much information that it becomes impossible to analyze.
It’s best to focus on logging the events that truly matter—those that could expose security vulnerabilities or pose a risk to your business.
The most important things that you should log are:
Logins and logouts: It’s essential to know who is accessing your systems and when—including failed login attempts, password changes, and new account creations.
Accessing sensitive data: You need to know who is accessing your most important and confidential information. You should log the files and databases being accessed in order to identify any unauthorized access to your data and/or systems.
System changes: This includes software installations, configurations, and updates. It’s very important to keep a record of these events so you have a history you can refer to in order to identify possible entry points, such as backdoors.
Now you know! The best way to start with event logging is by focusing on the most important things—the ones that could truly put your business at risk. In fact, this is especially helpful for companies with limited resources and time.
Centralize Your Logs
What does your kids’ room look like on the weekend? Well, that’s pretty much how your event log management would look if you try to handle it across different devices and systems.
Everything works much better when it’s simplified and brought down to its most essential form—but you might be asking: how can I centralize all my logs? Easy! With a SIEM, or Security Information and Event Management system—a solution that lets you group all your logs from every device and system into one single place. That way, you’ll have access to a complete overview of all your systems, devices, and applications at the same time.
This makes it easier to:
Detect patterns: If you can see logs span a number of different systems, you might be able to see the connecting pieces of the puzzle of suspicious activity.
Respond faster: If you can promptly review log history, all the evidence is at your fingertips. This is especially invaluable when incidents happen.
Have a unified view: You can view your network holistically and identify risks and vulnerabilities more easily.
Make Sure Your Logs Can’t Be Modified
This might seem pretty logical, but it’s important to say it out loud. After all, you can’t allow your event logs to be modified—they’re meant to help you identify threats. In short, they must be immutable, untouchable, non-editable, and any other word you can think of that means: HANDS OFF.
Herewith are some tips:
Log encryption: Just like you encrypt your data so prying eyes can’t decode or steal it, the same goes for your logs. Use encryption to make sure third parties and unauthorized users can’t access your event records.
WORM storage: No, it has nothing to do with worms or creepy crawlies. In fact, it stands for Write Once, Read Many (WORM). This means once a log is created, it becomes read-only and cannot be altered in any way. Not a bad name after all—especially since it helps keep invasive “worms” out.
Access restrictions: Make them as strict as possible and keep log access to a bare minimum.
The goal is to make your activity logs bulletproof—or well… tamper-proof… same idea. It’s all about keeping internal or external cybercriminals far away from your logs so they can’t sneak a “harmless” peek to see what they can steal.
Did we say harmless? Oops—we meant EXTREMELY MALICIOUS.
Anyway, we think it’s clear by now: event logs are off-limits. Period.
Implementing Log Retention Policies
The million-dollar question: How long should you keep your event logs? Maybe forever? Better not… Let’s talk about log retention policies instead.
There are a few things to consider:
Compliance: In some industries, there are regulations dictating how long you must keep logs.
Business requirements: Based on the nature of business do you need logs to conduct investigations or audit?
Storage space: If you remove logs before your retention policy allows, what if this overloads your storage without you knowing, or if your retention policy is too generous?
The best thing to do is find a middle ground. We don’t want to fall short, but we don’t want to overdo it either, right? What you need to make sure of is that you’re keeping the data you actually need—without compromising your system’s performance.
Reviewing Logs on a Regular Basis
Event logging is only as good as your ability to review it. Don’t just “set and forget” your logs. You should continually review your logs. Doing so helps you to identify anomalies and potentially suspicious patterns. It also allows you to react to threats before your organization suffers from major damage. You will benefit greatly from security software that allows some of this task to be automated.
Here are a number of ways to make this efficient:
Automated alerts: Alerts help you respond to events in real time or as soon as a critical event arises. For example, failed logon attempts or unauthorized access attempts.
Periodic review: You should be reviewing your logs and potential auditing data periodically. Spotting patterns will allow you to identify a potential threat.
Correlate events: Use your SIEM to correlate events of multiple activities to help identify the threat – you will start to detect more complex attacks and responses.
Help with Event Logging Solutions?
As a trusted managed IT Services provider, we would love to support you. We can help you implement these practices and keep your business safe, just reach out to us by email or phone and we can set a time to talk!
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This Article has been Republished with Permission from The Technology Press.