Ensure AWS Organizations changes are monitored

Risk Level: Low
Cloud Entity: CloudTrail
CloudGuard Rule ID: D9.AWS.MON.24
Covered by Spectral: Yes
Category: Management Tools

GSL LOGIC

List<CloudTrail> should have items with [hasSNSSubscriber='true' and metricFilters with [filterPattern isFilterPatternEqual('{ ($.eventSource = organizations.amazonaws.com) && (($.eventName = "AcceptHandshake") || ($.eventName = "AttachPolicy") || ($.eventName = "CreateAccount") || ($.eventName = "CreateOrganizationalUnit") || ($.eventName = "CreatePolicy") || ($.eventName = "DeclineHandshake") || ($.eventName = "DeleteOrganization") || ($.eventName = "DeleteOrganizationalUnit") || ($.eventName = "DeletePolicy") || ($.eventName = "DetachPolicy") || ($.eventName = "DisablePolicyType") || ($.eventName = "EnablePolicyType") || ($.eventName = "InviteAccountToOrganization") || ($.eventName = "LeaveOrganization") || ($.eventName = "MoveAccount") || ($.eventName = "RemoveAccountFromOrganization") || ($.eventName = "UpdatePolicy") || ($.eventName = "UpdateOrganizationalUnit")) }')]] length() > 0]

REMEDIATION

From Portal
A. To create a metric filter using the CloudWatch console

1. Open the CloudWatch console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudwatch/.
2. In the navigation pane, choose Log groups.
3. Choose the name of the log group.
4. Choose Actions, Create metric filter.
5. For Filter pattern, enter the filter pattern to use:
   { ($.eventSource = organizations.amazonaws.com) && (($.eventName = "AcceptHandshake") || ($.eventName = "AttachPolicy") || ($.eventName = "CreateAccount") || ($.eventName = "CreateOrganizationalUnit") || ($.eventName = "CreatePolicy") || ($.eventName = "DeclineHandshake") || ($.eventName = "DeleteOrganization") || ($.eventName = "DeleteOrganizationalUnit") || ($.eventName = "DeletePolicy") || ($.eventName = "DetachPolicy") || ($.eventName = "DisablePolicyType") || ($.eventName = "EnablePolicyType") || ($.eventName = "InviteAccountToOrganization") || ($.eventName = "LeaveOrganization") || ($.eventName = "MoveAccount") || ($.eventName = "RemoveAccountFromOrganization") || ($.eventName = "UpdatePolicy") || ($.eventName = "UpdateOrganizationalUnit")) }
6. Choose Next, and then enter a name for the filter.
7. Under Metric details, for Metric namespace, enter a name for the CloudWatch namespace where the metric will be published. If this namespace doesn't already exist, be sure that Create new is selected.
8. For Metric name, enter a name for the new metric.
9. For Metric value, if your metric filter is counting occurrences of the keywords in the filter, enter 1.
10. Choose Create metric filter.

B. Create an SNS topic that the alarm will notify here: https://ap-south-1.console.aws.amazon.com/sns

C. Create an SNS subscription to the topic created in step B here: https://ap-south-1.console.aws.amazon.com/sns

D. Create an alarm that is associated with the CloudWatch Logs Metric Filter created in step A and an SNS topic created in step B here: https://ap-south-1.console.aws.amazon.com/cloudwatch

From TF
To create log metric filter for AWS Organization changes:

resource "aws_cloudwatch_log_metric_filter" "yada" {
	name           = NAME
	pattern        = RELEVANT-FILTER-PATTERN
	log_group_name = LOG-GROUP-NAME
	...
}

From Command Line
Perform the following to setup the metric filter, alarm, SNS topic, and subscription:

1. Create a metric filter based on filter pattern provided which checks for AWS Organizations changes and the LOG-GROUP-NAME

aws logs put-metric-filter --log-group-name LOG-GROUP-NAME --filter-name FILTER-NAME --metric-transformations metricName=METRIC-NAME,metricNamespace=METRIC-NAMESPACE,metricValue=1 --filter-pattern '{ ($.eventSource = organizations.amazonaws.com) && (($.eventName = "AcceptHandshake") || ($.eventName = "AttachPolicy") || ($.eventName = "CreateAccount") || ($.eventName = "CreateOrganizationalUnit") || ($.eventName = "CreatePolicy") || ($.eventName = "DeclineHandshake") || ($.eventName = "DeleteOrganization") || ($.eventName = "DeleteOrganizationalUnit") || ($.eventName = "DeletePolicy") || ($.eventName = "DetachPolicy") || ($.eventName = "DisablePolicyType") || ($.eventName = "EnablePolicyType") || ($.eventName = "InviteAccountToOrganization") || ($.eventName = "LeaveOrganization") || ($.eventName = "MoveAccount") || ($.eventName = "RemoveAccountFromOrganization") || ($.eventName = "UpdatePolicy") || ($.eventName = "UpdateOrganizationalUnit")) }'

2. Create an SNS topic that the alarm will notify:

aws sns create-topic --name SNS-TOPIC-NAME

3. Create an SNS subscription to the topic created in step 2:

aws sns subscribe --topic-arn SNS-TOPIC-ARN --protocol PROTOCOL --notification-endpoint SNS-ENDPOINT

4. Create an alarm that is associated with the CloudWatch Logs Metric Filter created in step 1 and an SNS topic created in step 2:

aws cloudwatch put-metric-alarm --alarm-name ALARM-NAME --metric-name METRIC-NAME --statistic Sum --period 300 --threshold 1 --comparison-operator GreaterThanOrEqualToThreshold --evaluation-periods 1 --namespace METRIC-NAMESPACE --alarm-actions SNS-TOPIC-ARN

References

1. https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonCloudWatch/latest/logs/CreateMetricFilterProcedure.html
2. https://docs.aws.amazon.com/sns/latest/dg/sns-create-topic.html
3. https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonCloudWatch/latest/monitoring/ConsoleAlarms.html
4. https://registry.terraform.io/providers/hashicorp/aws/latest/docs/resources/cloudwatch_log_metric_filter
5. https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/reference/logs/put-metric-filter.html

CloudTrail

AWS CloudTrail is a service that enables governance, compliance, operational auditing, and risk auditing of your AWS account. With CloudTrail, you can log, continuously monitor, and retain account activity related to actions across your AWS infrastructure. CloudTrail provides event history of your AWS account activity, including actions taken through the AWS Management Console, AWS SDKs, command line tools, and other AWS services. This event history simplifies security analysis, resource change tracking, and troubleshooting.

Compliance Frameworks

• AWS CIS Foundations v. 1.3.0
• AWS CIS Foundations v. 1.4.0
• AWS CIS Foundations v. 1.5.0
• AWS CIS Foundations v. 2.0.0
• AWS CSA CCM v.4.0.1
• AWS CloudGuard SOC2 based on AICPA TSC 2017
• AWS HITRUST v11.0.0
• AWS ISO27001:2022
• AWS MITRE ATT&CK Framework v11.3
• AWS NIST 800-53 Rev 5
• CloudGuard AWS All Rules Ruleset