Netwrix Auditor Administrator Guide
Netwrix Auditor Administrator Guide
Netwrix Auditor Administrator Guide
Administration Guide
Version: 9.9
1/31/2020
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction 8
4. Monitoring Plans 24
4.2.2. Azure AD 36
4.2.4. Exchange 37
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4.2.9. Network Devices 44
4.2.11. SharePoint 46
4.2.15. VMware 51
4.3.1. AD Container 55
4.3.2. Computer 56
4.3.3. Domain 57
4.3.7. IP Range 59
4.3.8. NetApp 60
4.3.16. Integration 68
5. Data Collection 71
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6. Activity Summary Email 73
7. Intelligence 75
8. Settings 77
8.3. Investigations 83
8.4. Notifications 85
8.5. Integrations 87
8.6. Licenses 87
10.1. Manage Users with Netwrix Auditor Inactive User Tracker 104
10.2. Alert on Passwords with Netwrix Auditor Password Expiration Notifier 108
10.3. Monitor Events with Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager 113
10.3.3. Create Monitoring Plan for Netwrix Auditor System Health Log 120
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10.3.5. Create Alerts on Netwrix Auditor Server Health Status 123
10.4. Roll Back Changes with Netwrix Auditor Object Restore for Active Directory 131
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11.2.6. Registry Keys for Monitoring Group Policy 171
Index 182
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1. Introduction
1. Introduction
Looking for online version? Check out Netwrix Auditor help center.
This guide is intended for Netwrix Auditor global administrators and configurators, provides step–by–step
instructions on how to start monitoring your environments, create monitoring plans, configure Audit
Database settings and email notifications. It also provides information on fine- tuning the product,
additional configuration, etc.
This guide is intended for developers and Managed Service Providers. It provides instructions on how to
use Netwrix Auditor Configuration API for managing Netwrix Auditor configuration objects.
NOTE: It assumed that document readers have prior experience with RESTful architecture and solid
understanding of HTTP protocol. Technology and tools overview is outside the scope of the current
guide.
The product functionality described in this guide applies to Netwrix Auditor Standard Edition. Note that
Free Community Edition provides limited functionality. See Product Editions for more information.
Netwrix Auditor includes applications for Active Directory, Active Directory Federation Services, Azure AD,
Exchange, Office 365, Windows file servers, EMC storage devices, NetApp filer appliances, Nutanix Files,
network devices, SharePoint, Oracle Database, SQL Server, VMware, Windows Server, and User Activity.
Empowered with a RESTful API, the platform delivers visibility and control across all of your on-premises or
cloud-based IT systems in a unified way.
Major benefits:
To learn how Netwrix Auditor can help your achieve your specific business objectives, refer to Netwrix
Auditor Best Practices Guide.
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1. Introduction
Application Features
Netwrix Auditor for Active Netwrix Auditor for Active Directory detects and reports on all changes
Directory made to the managed Active Directory domain, including AD objects,
Group Policy configuration, directory partitions, and more. It makes
daily snapshots of the managed domain structure that can be used to
assess its state at present or at any moment in the past. The product
provides logon activity summary, reports on interactive and non-
interactive logons including failed logon attempts.
Netwrix Auditor for Azure AD Netwrix Auditor for Azure AD detects and reports on all changes made
to Azure AD configuration and permissions, including Azure AD
objects, user accounts, passwords, group membership, and more. The
products also reports on successful and failed logon attempts.
Netwrix Auditor for Exchange Netwrix Auditor for Exchange detects and reports on all changes made
to Microsoft Exchange configuration and permissions. In addition, it
tracks mailbox access events in the managed Exchange organization,
and notifies the users whose mailboxes have been accessed by non–
owners.
Netwrix Auditor for Office 365 Netwrix Auditor for Office 365 detects and reports on all changes
made to Microsoft Exchange Online and SharePoint Online.
Netwrix Auditor for Windows Netwrix Auditor for Windows File Servers detects and reports on all
File Servers changes made to Windows–based file servers, including modifications
of files, folders, shares and permissions, as well as failed and successful
access attempts.
Netwrix Auditor for EMC Netwrix Auditor for EMC detects and reports on all changes made to
EMC VNX/VNXe and Isilon storages, including modifications of files,
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Application Features
Netwrix Auditor for NetApp Netwrix Auditor for NetApp detects and reports on all changes made
to NetApp Filer appliances both in cluster- and 7- modes, including
modifications of files, folders, shares and permissions, as well as failed
and successful access attempts.
Netwrix Auditor for Nutanix Netwrix Auditor for Nutanix Files detects and reports on changes
Files made to SMB shared folders, subfolders and files stored on the
Nutanix File Server, including failed and successful attempts.
Netwrix Auditor for Oracle Netwrix Auditor for Oracle Database detects and reports on all
Database changes made to your Oracle Database instance configuration,
privileges and security settings, including database objects and
directories, user accounts, audit policies, sensitive data, and triggers.
The product also reports on failed and successful access attempts.
Netwrix Auditor for Netwrix Auditor for SharePoint detects and reports on read access
SharePoint and changes made to SharePoint farms, servers and sites, including
modifications of content, security settings and permissions.
Netwrix Auditor for SQL Server Netwrix Auditor for SQL Server detects and reports on all changes to
SQL Server configuration, database content, and logon activity.
Netwrix Auditor for VMware Netwrix Auditor for VMware detects and reports on all changes made
to ESX servers, folders, clusters, resource pools, virtual machines and
their virtual hardware configuration.
Netwrix Auditor for Windows Netwrix Auditor for Windows Server detects and reports on all
Server changes made to Windows– based server configuration, including
hardware devices, drivers, software, services, applications, networking
settings, registry settings, DNS, and more. It also provides automatic
consolidation and archiving of event logs data. With a stand-alone
Event Log Manager tool, Netwrix Auditor collects Windows event logs
from multiple computers across the network, stores them centrally in
a compressed format, and enables convenient analysis of event log
data.
Netwrix Auditor for User Netwrix Auditor for User Sessions detects and reports on all user
Activity actions during a session with the ability to monitor specific users,
applications and computers. The product can be configured to capture
a video of users' activity on the audited computers.
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1. Introduction
l Netwrix Auditor Server — the central component that handles the collection, transfer and
processing of audit data from the various data sources (audited systems). Data from the sources not
yet supported out of the box is collected using RESTful Integration API.
l Netwrix Auditor Client — a component that provides a friendly interface to authorized personnel
who can use this console UI to manage Netwrix Auditor settings, examine alerts, reports and search
results. Other users can obtain audit data by email or with 3rd party tools — for example, reports can
be provided to the management team via the intranet portal.
l Data sources — entities that represent the types of audited systems supported by Netwrix Auditor
(for example, Active Directory, Exchange Online, NetApp storage system, and so on), or the areas you
are interested in (Group Policy, User Activity, and others).
l Long-Term Archive — a file-based repository storage keeps the audit data collected from all your
data sources or imported using Integration API in a compressed format for a long period of time.
Default retention period is 120 months.
l Audit databases — these are Microsoft SQL Server databases used as operational storage. This type
of data storage allows you to browse recent data, run search queries, generate reports and alerts.
Typically, data collected from the certain data source (for example, Exchange Server) is stored to the
dedicated Audit database and the long-term archive. So, you can configure as many databases as the
data sources you want to process. Default retention period for data stored in the Audit database is
180 days.
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1. Introduction
1. Authorized administrators prepare IT infrastructure and data sources they are going to audit, as
recommended in Netwrix Auditor documentation and industry best practices; they use Netwrix
Auditor client (management UI) to set up automated data processing.
2. Netwrix Auditor collects audit data from the specified data source (application, server, storage
system, and so on).
To provide a coherent picture of changes that occurred in the audited systems, Netwrix Auditor can
consolidate data from multiple independent sources (event logs, configuration snapshots, change
history records, etc.). This capability is implemented with Netwrix Auditor Server and Integration API.
NOTE: For details on custom data source processing workflow, refer to the Integration API
documentation.
3. Audit data is stored to the Audit databases and the repository (Long-Term Archive) and preserved
there according to the corresponding retention settings.
4. Netwrix Auditor analyzes the incoming audit data and alerts appropriate staff about critical changes,
according to the built-in alerts you choose to use and any custom alerts you have created.
Authorized users use the Netwrix Auditor Client to view pre-built dashboards, run predefined reports,
conduct investigations, and create custom reports based on their searches. Other users obtain the
data they need via email or third-party tools.
5. To enable historical data analysis, Netwrix Auditor can extract data from the repository and import it
to the Audit database, where it becomes available for search queries and report generation.
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l Navigate to Start → Netwrix Auditor → Netwrix Auditor. You will see the Welcome page:
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To keep the monitoring process secure, Netwrix suggests configuring role-based access. Delegating control
ensures that only appropriate users can modify the product configuration or view audit data, based on
your company policies and the user's job responsibilities.
Global administrator
Limited
to delegated
scope
Reviewer Configurator
Helpdesk personnel Infrastructure Engineer
DB Admin
Senior managers
Roles are described briefly in the table below and explained in the further detail in the next topic.
Global Full control. Access to global The role should be assigned to a very limited
administrator settings, monitoring plan number of employees—typically, only the owner
configuration, collected data, of the Netwrix Auditor Server host in your
access delegation, etc. environment.
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Configurator Access to monitoring plan The role is appropriate for system administrators,
configuration within the infrastructure engineers, and members of
delegated scope: a operations team who manage network and
monitoring plan or a folder services in your organization but should not have
with monitoring plans access to sensitive data.
Global reviewer Access to all data collected The role is appropriate for key employees who
by Netwrix Auditor and need to review audit data collected across various
intelligence and visibility data sources— typically, IT managers, chief
features. information security officer, and so on.
Reviewer Access to data collected by The role is appropriate for members of security
Netwrix Auditor and team and helpdesk personnel who are responsible
intelligence and visibility for mitigating risks in a certain sector of your
features within the delegated environment (e.g., domain, file share).
scope.
This role is granted to specialists who use Netwrix
Auditor Integration API to retrieve data from the
Audit Database.
Contributor Write access to Netwrix This service role is granted to specialists who use
Auditor Server and Audit Netwrix Auditor Integration API to write data to
Database. the Audit Database. This role is also granted to
service accounts or any accounts used for
interaction with Netwrix Auditor Server (e.g., add-
on scripts).
Launch Netwrix + + + + +
Auditor client
Delegate control, + – – – –
grant and revoke
permissions
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Modify global + – – – –
settings (including
default Audit
Database, licenses,
retention settings,
etc.)
List folders + + + + +
List monitoring + + + + +
plans, review status
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Manage state-in-time + + – – –
data, upload
snapshots to the
Audit Database
Intelligence
List reports + + + + +
Restricted to
the delegated
scope (folder
or monitoring
plan)
List report + + + + +
subscriptions
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Create, modify, + + – – –
remove
subscriptions
Restricted to
the delegated
scope (folder
or monitoring
plan)
List alerts + + + + +
Create, modify, + + – – –
delete alerts
Import investigation + – – – –
data from the Long-
Term Archive
View investigation + + – – –
data
View Behavior + + – – –
Anomalies list
Update anomaly + + – – –
status
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Customize risk + + - - -
indicators
Write Activity + – – – +
Records
Retrieve Activity + + + – –
Records
Restricted to
the delegated
scope (folder
or monitoring
plan)
Netwrix Auditor allows assigning roles not only on the product as a whole but also on a specific scope that
can be limited to a single monitoring plan or to the contents of a folder. This is helpful when you want to
achieve more granular separation of duties with the product. For example, to ensure that database
administrators (DBAs) have no access to Active Directory management data, domain administrators have
no permissions to view database schema changes or update data collection settings.
Global administrator, Global reviewer, and Contributor roles are assigned on the global scope only. On
folder and plan levels, you may leverage role separation capabilities too: designate Configurators and
Reviewers. The roles are inherited from a higher level and cannot be revoked locally, i.e., Global reviewer
has access to all collected data while local Reviewer can generate reports and run search on data limited to
his or her scope.
Scope Roles
Global reviewer
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Scope Roles
Contributor
Reviewer
Reviewer
1. On the main Netwrix Auditor page, navigate to the Monitoring Plans section.
2. Browse your monitoring plans tree and select the scope you want to delegate to a user (e.g., All
monitoring plans root folder, a folder, or a monitoring plan).
3. Click Delegate.
To Do
2. In the dialog that opens, specify a user (or a group) and a role.
Along with adding a new Global administrator , Global reviewer , or Reviewer , Netwrix Auditor will
automatically assign this user the Browser role on the Report Server. The Browser role is required to
generate reports and is granted on all reports or within a delegated scope. If for some reason, Netwrix
Auditor is unable to grant the Browser role, configure it manually. See Netwrix Auditor Installation and
Configuration Guide for more information.
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NOTE: Netwrix Auditor uses system accounts for data processing and
interaction between product components.
During the Netwrix Auditor Server installation, Netwrix Auditor Administrators and Netwrix Auditor
Client Users groups are created automatically. To delegate control through group membership, add users
to these groups on the computer where Netwrix Auditor Server resides. Keep in mind that users will be
granted roles with extended permissions while it may be reasonable to limit their scope to a specific
monitoring plan.
1. On the computer where Netwrix Auditor Server is installed, start the Local Users and Computers
snap-in.
2. Navigate to the Groups node and locate the Netwrix Auditor Administrators or Netwrix Auditor
Client Users group.
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However, in some cases, organizations need to provide certain employees with access to a limited set of
audit data. For example, an auditor might need to review particular access reports once or twice a year. You
can provide these users (recipients) with means to review the data they need without actually running
Netwrix Auditor. This ensures that dedicated specialists have access to the data while preventing data
breaches and ensuring that sensitive data is not being distributed across the whole company.
Netwrix recommends granting limited access permissions to employees who need to:
Schedule email This is helpful when you want to share information with a group of employees,
report external consultants, auditors, and so on. Reports are sent according to a specified
subscriptions schedule and recipients can review them, but they do not have any other means
to access audit data. Basically, this option is enough for employees who are
interested in a high- level summary— for example, an auditor who performs
monthly access rights attestation on critical folders or a senior manager.
Publish reports to This scenario works great for a helpdesk with several departments. Assume, each
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file shares department has its own field of responsibility and must not disclose information to
other departments. You can configure Netwrix Auditor to publish reports to
folders that can be accessed by employees from a specific department only. You
might set up the following folders and permissions:
l The user support team has access to a folder with reports on account
lockouts and password resets.
l File server helpdesk personnel have access to a different folder with daily
reports listing all file removals.
Configure alerts This is helpful for rare occasions when you have to notify some senior specialists
about critical system state that has to be addressed immediately, e.g., CISO must
mitigate risks in the event of massive deletions in the sensitive data storage.
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4. Monitoring Plans
4. Monitoring Plans
To start auditing your environment and analyzing user behavior with Netwrix Auditor, create a monitoring
plan. All your monitoring plans are listed in the Monitoring Plans section.
A monitoring plan defines your data sources and general data collection, notification, and storage settings.
To start collecting data, choose a data source, such as Active Directory or SharePoint, and add items to its
scope. Item is a specific object you want to audit, e.g., a server, SharePoint farm. All data sources and items
in your plan share common settings so that you can supervise and manage several data collections as one.
On a high level, you should perform the following steps to start monitoring your environment:
1. Create a monitoring plan with a wizard. See Create a New Plan for more information.
2. Add data sources. Although you are prompted to select the first data source in the wizard, you can
specify more data sources later. See Manage Data Sources for more information.
3. Add items for monitoring. Netwrix Auditor does not collect data until you specify an item. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
Once you create a plan, it becomes available in the Monitoring Plans section. To review your plan, navigate
to the Monitoring Plans section and expand the All Monitoring Plans tree.
To.. Do..
See plan overview Click on a plan name to see data sources included in the plan and data
collection status for each data source.
Update data collection status Select a plan and click Edit. On the page that opens, click Update.
and generate Activity
Summary with latest
changes
Modify plan settings, add or Select a plan and click Edit. On the page that opens, review your plan in
delete data sources, add or details. Review the following for additional information:
delete items
l Manage Data Sources
Assign roles Click Delegate to review current delegations and assign roles. You can
delegate control of a monitoring plan to another administrator, or grant
read access— reviewer role— to the data collected by this plan. To
simplify delegation, you can further organize the monitoring plans into
folders. See Role-Based Access and Delegation for more information.
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To.. Do..
Review data collected for the Select a plan and click Edit. On the page that opens, click Search in the
monitoring plan Intelligence section. The interactive search page will appear with a
monitoring plan filter set to your plan name.
l On the main Netwrix Auditor page, in the Quick Start section, click the tile with a data source of your
choice, e.g., Active Directory. If you need a data source that is not listed on the main page, click All
data sources.
l On the main Netwrix Auditor page, in the Configuration section, click the Monitoring Plans tile. On
the Monitoring Plans page, select Add Plan.
l Specify default SQL Server instance and configure the Audit Database to store your data
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Option Description
Specify the account for Provide a user name and a password for the account that Netwrix Auditor
collecting data will use to collect data. By default, the user name is prepopulated with your
account name.
Make sure the account has sufficient permissions to collect data. For a full list
of the rights and permissions, and instructions on how to configure them,
refer to Configure Data Collecting Account . Netwrix recommends creating a
special service account with extended permissions.
When you configure a monitoring plan for the first time, the account you
specify for data collection will be set as default.
Enable network traffic If selected, this option instructs Netwrix Auditor to deploy a special utility
compression that will run on the audited computers and do the following:
This approach helps to optimize load balance and reduce network traffic. So,
using this option can be recommended especially for distributed networks
with remote locations that have limited bandwidth. See Network Traffic
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Option Description
Adjust audit settings Netwrix Auditor can configure audit settings in your environment
automatically automatically. Select Adjust audit settings automatically . In this case,
Netwrix Auditor will continually check and enforce the relevant audit policies.
Consider, however, that for some data sources this approach is mostly
recommended for evaluation purposes in test environments; in the
production environment, manual cofniguration is used more often (for
example, for Windows File Servers).
You may also want to apply audit settings via GPO (for example, for Windows
Servers).
For a full list of audit settings and instructions on how to configure them
manually, refer to Configure IT Infrastructure for Auditing and Monitoring.
Collect data for state-in- State-in-time reports are based on the daily configuration snapshots of your
time reports audited systems; they help you to analyze particular aspects of the
environment. State-in-time configuration snapshots are also used for IT risks
assessment metrics and reports.
This data collection option is available if you are creating a monitoring plan
for any of the following data sources:
l Active Directory
l File Servers
l Windows Server
l Group Policy
l SharePoint
l SharePoint Online
l Exchange Online
To read more, refer to State– in– Time Reports and IT Risk Assessment
Overview .
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4. Monitoring Plans
the wizard creates an Audit Database for each plan. At this step, you should specify the default SQL Server
instance that will host Netwrix Auditor databases. To read more, refer to SQL Server and Audit Database.
NOTE: Alternatively, you can instruct Netwrix Auditor not to store data to the databases but only to the
repository (Long-Term Archive) – in this scenario, you will only be able to receive activity summaries.
Reporting and alerting capabilities will not be provided.
NOTE: Netwrix Auditor skips this step if you have already configured Audit Database settings for other
monitoring plans.
l Disable security intelligence and make data available only in activity summaries — select this
option if you do not want audit data to be written to the Audit Database. In this case, data will be
available only in Activity Summary emails. Alerts, reports and search capabilities will not be
supported.
NOTE: If you later clear this option to start saving data to the database, consider that already
collected audit data will not be imported in that database.
l Install a new instance of Microsoft SQL Server Express automatically — this option is available
at the first run of the wizard. It allows you to deploy SQL Server 2016 SP2 Express with Advanced
Services on the local machine. This SQL Server will be used as default host for Netwrix Auditor
databases.
NOTE: It is strongly recommended that you plan for your databases first, as described in Database
Sizing section. Remember that database size in SQL Server Express edition may be insufficient
for your audited infrastructure.
l Use an existing SQL Server instance — select this option to use an existing SQL Server instance.
NOTE: Local SQL Server instance is detected automatically, and input fields are pre-populated with its
settings.
Option Description
SQL Server instance Specify the name of the SQL Server instance to store audit data.
NOTE: If you have more than one Netwrix Auditor Server running
in your network, make sure to configure them to use
different SQL Server instances. The same SQL Server
instance cannot be used to store audit data collected by
several Netwrix Auditor Servers.
Authentication Select the authentication type you want to use to connect to the
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Option Description
l Windows authentication
User name Specify the account to be used to connect to the SQL Server
instance.
You can use default settings for your SQL Server instance or modify them (e.g., use a different
authentication method or user). You can also change these settings later. See Audit Database for more
information.
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Setting Description
Disable security intelligence ... Only select this option if you do not want your data to
be stored in the database. In this case, you will only be
able to receive activity summaries. Reporting and
alerting capabilities will not be provided.
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Setting Description
from others.
Use default SQL Server settings Select this option if you want Netwrix Auditor to connect
to the SQL Server instance using the default settings you
specified Default SQL Server Instance .
Specify custom connection parameters Select this option to use custom credentials when
connecting to SQL Server. Specify authentication
method and the account that Netwrix Auditor will use.
Netwrix Auditor will connect to the default SQL Server instance and create a database with the specified
name on it.
NOTE: Global settings that apply to all databases with audit data (including retention period and SSRS
server used for reporting) are available on the Audit Database page of Netwrix Auditor settings.
See Audit Database for details.
NOTE: You can skip this step if you do not want to receive email notifications, or configure SMTP settings
later, as described in the related section.
NOTE: It is recommended to click Send Test Email . The system will send a test message to the specified
email address and inform you if any problems are detected.
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To start collecting data, you should specify the objects (items) that belong to the target data source and
should be processed according to the settings of this monitoring plan. For example, for Exchange data
source the item will be your Exchange server, for Windows Server data source - computer, IP range or AD
container, and so on. To add items right after finishing the monitoring plan wizard, select the Add item
now checkbox. See Add Items for Monitoring for details.
NOTE: A monitoring plan cannot collect data until at least one item is specified.
Some data sources require additional system components and updates to be installed on your computer.
In this case, Netwrix Auditor will inform you and prompt you to check data source prerequisites instead of
adding an item.
NOTE: Netwrix Auditor for Oracle Database incompatible with Oracle Data Access Components for .Net
Framework 4.0 and above. Check that the .Net Framework 3.5 feature is enabled prior to
downloading prerequisites.
l Customize data source's scope and settings (e.g., enable read access auditing)
l Enable state-in-time data collection (currently supported for several data sources)
l Depending on the data source, customize the monitoring scope (e.g., enable read access auditing,
monitoring of failed attempts)
NOTE: To add, modify and remove data sources, enable or disable monitoring, you must be assigned the
Global administrator role in the product or the Configurator role on the plan. See Role-Based Access
and Delegation for more information.
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4. Monitoring Plans
2. Within the monitoring plan window, highlight the data source (the first one is the row right under the
blue table header) and click Edit data source on the right:
l Active Directory
l Azure AD
l Exchange
l Exchange Online
l File Servers
l Group Policy
l Logon Activity
l Oracle Database
l SharePoint
l SharePoint Online
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l SQL Server
l User Activity
l Windows Server
l VMware
l Netwrix API
Also, you can add a data source to the monitoring plan, or remove a data source that is no longer needed.
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Monitor Active Directory Select which of your Active Directory environment partitions you
partitions want to audit. By default, Netwrix Auditor only tracks changes to the
Domain partition and the Configuration partition of the audited
domain. If you also want to audit changes to the Schema partition,
or to disable auditing of changes to the Configuration partition,
select one of the following:
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Option Description
Detect additional details Specify additional information to include in reports and activity
summaries. Select Group membershipif you want to include Group
membership of the account under which the change was made.
Specify data collection method You can enable network traffic compression. If enabled, a
Compression Service will be automatically launched on the audited
computer, collecting and prefiltering data. This significantly improves
data transfer and minimizes the impact on the target computer
performance.
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit
settings will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if
necessary.
Collect data for state- in- time Configure Netwrix Auditor to store daily snapshots of your
reports SharePoint Online configuration required for further state-in-time
reports generation. See State–in–Time Reports for more
information.
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Option Description
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
4.2.2. Azure AD
Complete the following fields:
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Monitor Azure AD logon activity Specify what types of logon events you want to monitor:
l Failed logons
l Successful logons
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Specify data collection method You can enable network traffic compression. If enabled, a
Compression Service will be automatically launched on the audited
computer, collecting and pre-filtering data. This significantly
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Option Description
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit
settings will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if
necessary.
NOTE: If any conflicts are detected with your current audit settings,
automatic audit configuration will not be performed.
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
4.2.4. Exchange
Complete the following fields:
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Detect additional details Specify additional information to include in reports and activity
summaries. Select Group membershipif you want to include Group
membership of the account under which the change was made.
Specify data collection method You can enable network traffic compression. If enabled, a
Compression Service will be automatically launched on the audited
computer, collecting and prefiltering data. This significantly improves
data transfer and minimizes the impact on the target computer
performance.
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit
settings will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if
necessary.
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Option Description
Collect data on non-owner Enable monitoring of unauthorized access to mailboxes within your
access to mailboxes Exchange organization. Configure the following:
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
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Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit
settings will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if
necessary.
Collect data for state- in- time Configure Netwrix Auditor to store daily snapshots of your Exchange
reports Online configuration required for further state-in-time reports
generation. See State–in–Time Reports for more information.
Collect data on non-owner Enable monitoring of unauthorized access to mailboxes within your
access to mailboxes Exchange Online organization. Configure the following:
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
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Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Detect additional details Specify additional information to include in reports and activity
summaries. Select Group membershipif you want to include Group
membership of the account under which the change was made.
Specify data collection method You can enable network traffic compression. If enabled, a
Compression Service will be automatically launched on the audited
computer, collecting and prefiltering data. This significantly improves
data transfer and minimizes the impact on the target computer
performance.
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit
settings will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if
necessary.
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
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Option Description
Monitor this data source Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
and collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Specify actions for Specify actions you want to track and auditing mode. Review the
monitoring following for additional information:
Changes
Successful Use this option to track changes to your data. Helps
find out who made changes to your files, including
their creation and deletion.
Failed Use this option to detect suspicious activity on your
file server. Helps identify potential intruders who tried
to modify or delete files, etc., but failed to do it.
Read access
Successful Use this option to supervise access to files containing
confidential data intended for privileged users. Helps
identify who accessed important files besides your
trusted users.
Specify data collection You can enable network traffic compression. If enabled, a Compression
method Service will be automatically launched on the audited computer,
collecting and prefiltering data. This significantly improves data transfer
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Option Description
NOTE: To collect data from 32- bit operating systems, network traffic
compression must be disabled.
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit settings
will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if necessary.
Windows + + + + + +
EMC Celerra\VNX + + + — + —
NetApp Data + + + + + +
ONTAP 7 and 8 in
7-mode
NetApp Clustered + + + + + —
Data ONTAP 8
and ONTAP 9
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Option Description
Collect data for state-in-time Configure Netwrix Auditor to store daily snapshots of your system
reports configuration required for further state-in-time reports generation. See
State–in–Time Reports for more information.
NOTE: The product updates the latest snapshot on the regular basis to
keep users up to date on actual system state. Only the latest
snapshot is available for reporting in Netwrix Auditor. If you want
to generate reports based on different snapshots, you must
import snapshots to the Audit Database.
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
NOTE: Netwrix Auditor supports auditing of DFS and clustered file servers if Object Access Auditing is
enabled on DFS file shares or on every cluster node.
l When adding a cluster file server for auditing, it is recommended to specify a server name of
the Role server or a UNC path of the shared folder located on the Role server.
l When adding a DFS file share for auditing, specify a Windows file share item and provide the
UNC path of the whole namespace or UNC path of the DFS link (folder). For example:
l For recommendations on configuring DFS replication, refer to this Knowledge Base article.
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Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Fine-tune logon activity Specify interval for Netwrix Auditor to collect data on logon activity
monitoring and add successful non-interactive logons to your auditing scope, if
necessary.
Specify data collection method You can enable network traffic compression. If enabled, a
Compression Service will be automatically launched on the audited
computer, collecting and prefiltering data. This significantly improves
data transfer and minimizes the impact on the target computer
performance.
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit
settings will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if
necessary.
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
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Option Description
Specify actions for monitoring Specify monitoring rules for your network devices.
Specify port and protocol for Use Port and Protocol to provide the port required for incoming
incoming connections connections (default is UDP port 514 ).
Option Description
General
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Monitor Oracle Database logon Specify what types of logon events you want to monitor:
activity
l Failed logons
l Successful logons
l Logoffs
Users
Specify users to track their Use controls in this section to populate the corresponding lists -click
activity Add and specify user name and type (OS or database user).
Database Objects
Data objects to monitor Create rules for objects and actions that you want to audit:
4. Click Add.
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Option Description
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
4.2.11. SharePoint
Complete the following fields:
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Detect additional details Specify additional information to include in reports and activity
summaries. Select Group membershipif you want to include Group
membership of the account under which the change was made.
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit
settings will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if
necessary.
Collect data for state- in- time Configure Netwrix Auditor to store daily snapshots of your system
reports configuration required for further state-in-time reports generation.
See State–in–Time Reports for more information.
NOTE: The product updates the latest snapshot on the regular basis
to keep users up to date on actual system state. Only the
latest snapshot is available for reporting in Netwrix Auditor. If
you want to generate reports based on different snapshots,
you must import snapshots to the Audit Database.
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Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Audit SharePoint Online Configuration and content changes are always audited.
configuration and content
changes
Audit SharePoint Online read Configure Netwrix Auditor to monitor SharePoint Online read access.
access
Collect data for state-in-time Configure Netwrix Auditor to store daily snapshots of your
reports SharePoint Online configuration required for further state-in-time
reports generation. See State–in–Time Reports for more
information.
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
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Option Description
General
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Audit SQL Server configuration SQL Server configuration changes are always audited.
changes
Monitor SQL Server logon Specify what types of logon events you want to monitor: successful
activity or failed, performed through Windows and SQL authentication.
Data
Monitor changes to data in the Enable monitoring of changes to data stored in the database tables
database tables hosted on the SQL Server.
Changes (per transaction) to Specify how many changes per a database transaction you want to
collect and report: be collected. For example, you can limit this number to 10 changes
per transaction, or collect all changes.
Monitoring rules Create rules for the data to be audited and therefore to receive
change reports on the selected data only. Set the number of data
changes per SQL transaction to be included in reports. In this case
Netwrix Auditor-specific data will be written to the audited tables.
Click Add Rule to create columns auditing rules and configure the
following:
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Option Description
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
Option Description
General
Monitor this data source and collect Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure
activity data Netwrix Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Notify users about activity You can enable the message that will be displayed when a user
monitoring logs in and specify the message text.
Record video of user activity within When enabled, the product records video in addition to user
sessions sessions events collection. This option is disabled by default.
Video Recording
NOTE: For these settings to become effective, enable video recording on the General tab.
Adjust video duration Limit video file length by adjusting the following:
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Option Description
Set a retention period to clear stale When the selected retention period is over, Netwrix Auditor
videos deletes your video recordings.
Users
Specify users to track their activity Select the users whose activity should be recorded. You can
select All users or create a list of Specific users or user
groups. Certain users can also be added to Exceptions list.
Applications
Specify applications you want to Select the applications that you want to monitor. You can select
track All applications or create a list of Specific applications .
Certain applications can also be added to Exceptions list.
Monitored Computers
For a newly created monitoring plan for User Activity, the list of monitored computers is empty. Add
items to your monitoring plan and wait until Netwrix Auditor retrieves all computers within these items.
See Add Items for Monitoring for more information. The list contains computer name, its current status
and last activity time.
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
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4.2.15. VMware
Complete the following fields:
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Monitor VMware configuration Configuration changes are always monitored for VMware data
changes source. See this section for details.
Monitor VMware logon activity Specify what types of logon events you want to monitor for VMware
infrastructure.
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
Monitor changes to system Select the system components that you want to audit for changes.
components Review the following for additional information:
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Option Description
Specify data collection method You can enable network traffic compression. If enabled, a
Compression Service will be automatically launched on the audited
computer, collecting and prefiltering data. This significantly improves
data transfer and minimizes the impact on the target computer
performance.
Configure audit settings You can adjust audit settings automatically. Your current audit
settings will be checked on each data collection and adjusted if
necessary.
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Option Description
Collect data for state- in- time Configure Netwrix Auditor to store daily snapshots of your system
reports configuration required for further state-in-time reports generation.
See State–in–Time Reports for more information.
NOTE: The product updates the latest snapshot on the regular basis
to keep users up to date on actual system state. Only the
latest snapshot is available for reporting in Netwrix Auditor. If
you want to generate reports based on different snapshots,
you must import snapshots to the Audit Database.
Review your data source settings and click Add to go back to your plan. The newly created data source will
appear in the Data source list. As a next step, click Add item to specify an object for monitoring. See Add
Items for Monitoring for more information.
If you want to associate data from your custom data source or SIEM solution with a certain plan, add a
Netwrix API data source to your plan and mark the plan name in activity records before import. In this
case, data will be written to the database linked to your monitoring plan. This can be helpful:
l If you need to restrict access to imported data. In this case only the users who are granted
permissions to see the plan data will get access to imported activity records.
l If you want to simplify your search. In this case, you will be able to specify filters, such as Monitoring
plan and Data source, and find the imported activity records faster.
l If you want to use Netwrix Auditor as intermediate solution in your monitoring routine. In this case,
you will be able to export previously imported data.
NOTE: The account used to import activity records must be assigned a special Contributor role. See Role-
Based Access and Delegation for more information.
Option Description
Monitor this data source and Enable monitoring of the selected data source and configure Netwrix
collect activity data Auditor to collect and store audit data.
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Option Description
To further diversify your data, add Integration items to your Netwrix API data source. See Integration for
more information.
NOTE: Make sure Integration API is enabled. To check it, navigate to Settings → Integrations tab. See
Integrations for more information.
Make sure to provide a monitoring plan name in activity records before importing data. See
Netwrix Auditor Integration API Guide for detailed instructions on API commands and Activity
Record structure.
Each data source has a dedicated item type. Netwrix Auditor automatically suggests item types associated
with your data source.
Group Policy
Exchange
Logon Activity
Exchange Online
SharePoint Online
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IP Range
NetApp
IP Range
IP Range
NOTE: To add, modify and remove items, you must be assigned the Global administrator role in the
product or the Configurator role on the plan. See Role-Based Access and Delegation for more
information.
You can fine-tune data collection for each item individually. To do it, select an item within your monitoring
plan and click Edit item. For each item, you can:
l Customize settings specific your item (e.g., specify SharePoint site collections)
4.3.1. AD Container
Complete the following fields:
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Option Description
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
4.3.2. Computer
Complete the following fields:
Option Description
Specify a computer Provide a server name by entering its FQDN, NETBIOS or IPv4
address. You can click Browse to select a computer from the list of
computers in your network.
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
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4.3.3. Domain
Complete the following fields:
Option Description
Specify Active Directory domain Specify the audited domain name in the FQDN format. For example,
"company.local".
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
Option Description
Specify AD FS federation server Provide a server name by entering its FQDN, NETBIOS or IPv4
address. You can click Browse to select a computer from the list of
computers in your network.
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
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Option Description
General
Specify EMC Isilon storage array Provide the IP address or the host name of the name server used to
connect to your access zone. For example, account.corp.lab
Access Zone Enter the name of access zone partition within your EMC Isilon
cluster. For example, zone_account
OneFS web administration Enter EMC Isilon web administration URL (e.g.,
interface URL https://isiloncluster.corp.lab:8080 ). This URL is used to get
configuration details about your Isilon cluster via OneFS API.
File Share UNC path to audit Path to the file share located on a EMC Isilon with event log files (e.g.,
logs \\srv\netwrix_audit$\logs\).
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
Scope
Monitor the following shares If you want to limit your auditing scope by several shares, click Add
under the Specific file shares and select shared folders. Otherwise,
all file shares (except hidden) hosted on this server will be audited.
Option Description
General
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Option Description
Specify EMC VNX or VNXe Provide a server name by entering its FQDN, NETBIOS or IPv4
storage array address. You can click Browse to select a computer from the list of
computers in your network.
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
Scope
Monitor the following shares If you want to limit your auditing scope by several shares, click Add
under the Specific file shares and select shared folders. Otherwise,
all file shares (except hidden) hosted on this server will be audited.
4.3.7. IP Range
Complete the following fields:
Option Description
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
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4.3.8. NetApp
Complete the following fields:
Option Description
General
Specify NetApp file server Provide a server name by entering its FQDN, NETBIOS or IPv4
address. You can click Browse to select a computer from the list of
computers in your network.
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
ONTAPI
l HTTP
l HTTPS
Specify management interface Select management interface to connect to ONTAPI. If you want to
use custom management interface for ONTAPI, select Custom and
provide a server name by entering its FQDN, NETBIOS or IP address.
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Option Description
Specify account for connecting Select an account to connect to NetApp and collect data through
to ONTAPI ONTAPI. If you want to use a specific account (other than the one
you specified on the General tab), select Custom and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
Scope
Monitor the following shares If you want to limit your auditing scope by several shares, click Add
under the Specific file shares and select shared folders. Otherwise,
all file shares (except hidden) hosted on this server will be audited.
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Option Description
General
Specify Nutanix File Server Provide a server name by entering its FQDN, NETBIOS or IPv4 address.
You can click Browse to select a computer from the list of computers in
your network.
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If you
collecting data want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified during
monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter credentials.
Specify listening port for Provide the name of the TCP port to listen to notifications on the
incoming connections operations with Nutanix file shares. Default is 9898 .
For details on how to open the port, refer to Open 9898 and 9699 Ports
for Inbound Connections.
Specify account for Specify the account that will be used to connect to Nutanix REST API.
connecting to Nutanix File This account should have sufficient privileges on the Nutanix File Server.
Server REST API For details, refer to Create User Account to Access Nutanix REST API.
Scope
Monitor the following By default, all file shares (except hidden) hosted on this server will be
shares audited.
To limit your auditing scope to the certain shares, select Specific file
shares, then click Add and in the Add File Share dialog specify a path to
the shared folder you need, or a subfolder of the share.
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Option Description
Option Description
Specify Office 365 Account Specify email address and password of your Microsoft account that
will be used to connect to Office 365.
Option Description
Specify Oracle Database Provide connection details in the following format: host:port/service_
instance name. Make sure audit settings are configured for your Oracle
Database instance.
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
Option Description
General
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Option Description
Specify SharePoint farm for Enter the SharePoint Central Administration website URL.
monitoring
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
Core Service
Deploy Netwrix Auditor for Select deployment method for the Core Service. Select one of the
SharePoint Core Service following:
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Option Description
Changes
Audit SharePoint permissions Select change types to be audited with Netwrix Auditor.
and content changes
Netwrix Auditor allows auditing the entire SharePoint farm.
Alternatively, you can limit the auditing scope to separate web
applications and site collections. To do it, select Specific SharePoint
objects and do one of the following:
Read Access
Audit SharePoint read access Configure Netwrix Auditor to track read access to lists and list items
within your SharePoint farm except for Central Administration web
sites. Select Sites only if you want to enable read access auditing on
SharePoint sites only. Enable Sites and subsites to track read access
on each subsite. Then, do one of the following:
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Option Description
l Click Import , select encoding type, and browse for a file that
contains a list of sites.
Option Description
Specify SQL Server instance Specify the name of the SQL Server instance.
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
Option Description
Specify VMware ESX, ESXi, or Specify the ESX or ESXi host URL, or vCenter Server URL.
vCenter for monitoring
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If
collecting data you want to use a specific account (other than the one you specified
during monitoring plan creation), select Custom account and enter
credentials. The credentials are case sensitive.
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Option Description
Option Description
Specify Windows file Provide UNC path to a shared resource. See the section below for special
share considerations.
NOTE: Do not specify a default file share mapped to a local drive (e.g.,
\\Server\e$).
Specify the account for Select the account that will be used to collect data for this item. If you want
collecting data to use a specific account (other than the one you specified during monitoring
plan creation), select Custom account and enter credentials. The credentials
are case sensitive.
NOTE: A custom account must be granted the same permissions and access
rights as the default account used for data collection. See Netwrix
Auditor Installation and Configuration Guide for more information.
Netwrix Auditor supports auditing of DFS and clustered file servers if Object Access Auditing is enabled on
DFS file shares or on every cluster node.
l When adding a cluster file server for auditing, it is recommended to specify a server name of the Role
server or a UNC path of the shared folder located on the Role server.
l When adding a DFS file share for auditing, specify a Windows file share item and provide the UNC path
of the whole namespace or UNC path of the DFS link (folder). For example:
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l For recommendations on configuring DFS replication, refer to this Knowledge Base article.
l If a mount point represents a shared folder, then the objects in its root will be initially collected by
Netwrix Auditor and appear as processed by System account. Wait for the next data collections - then
all actions for these objects will be monitored in a normal way.
l To monitor the mount points targeted at the subfolder of a file share, provide network path to the
target subfolder.
4.3.16. Integration
Integration is a custom item type that helps diversify activity records coming from custom sources and
integrations (e.g., Amazon Web Services, Cisco devices) within Netwrix API data source. It is optional to
add this item to your monitoring plan.
Option Description
Specify a name for your Specify the add- on name or provide any other name that
integration distinguishes this custom source from any other.
This name will be listed in the Item filter in the interactive search.
NOTE: Make sure Integration API is enabled. To check it, navigate to Settings → Integrations tab. See
Integrations for more information.
Make sure to provide a monitoring plan name and item name in activity records before importing
data. See Netwrix Auditor Integration API Guide for detailed instructions on API commands and
Activity Record structure.
NOTE: To modify most plan settings, you must be assigned the Global administrator role in the product or
the Configurator role on the plan. The Global reviewer or this plan's Reviewer can modify Activity
Summary recipients. See Role-Based Access and Delegation for more information.
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4. Monitoring Plans
1. Select a plan in the All Monitoring Plans list and click Edit.
3. In the Plan Settings page, review the tabs and modify settings.
Option Description
General
Description
Data Collection
Specify the account for Specify a new user name and a password for the account that
collecting data Netwrix Auditor will use to collect data.
l User name Make sure the account has sufficient permissions to collect data. For
a full list of the rights and permissions, and instructions on how to
l Password
configure them, refer to Netwrix Auditor Installation and
Configuration Guide.
Audit Database
Disable security intelligence Keep this checkbox cleared if you want Netwrix Auditor to write
and make data available data to the Audit Database.
only in activity summaries
Use default SQL Server Select this checkbox to write data to a SQL Server instance with
settings connection parameters as shown in Settings → Audit Database .
See Audit Database for more information.
Specify custom connection Specify this option to use non-default settings (e.g., use a different
parameters authentication method or user).
NOTE: Make sure to store data on the same SQL Server instance.
Otherwise some data may become unavailable for search
and reporting.
Notifications
Specify Activity Summary Configure how often you want to receive an Activity Summary. By
delivery schedule default, it is delivered once a day, at 3 AM. You can specify custom
delivery time and frequency (e.g., every 6 hours starting 12 AM—at
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Option Description
Customize notifications By default, Activity Summary lists changes and activity in email
body. For most data sources, if an Activity Summaries contains
more than 1,000 activity records, these records are sent as a CSV
attachment, bigger attachments are compressed in ZIP files.
Specify the recipients who Modify a list of users who will receive daily activity summaries. Click
will receive daily activity Add Recipient and provide email address.
summaries
NOTE: It is recommended to click Send Test Email . The system will
send a test message to the specified email address and
inform you if any problems are detected.
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5. Data Collection
5. Data Collection
On a high level, the Netwrix Auditor data collection works as follows:
1. Once a monitoring plan is created, a data source is specified, and an item is added, Netwrix Auditor
Server starts collecting data from the Active Directory domain or organizational unit, a server, a
SharePoint farm, Office 365 tenant, or VMware Virtual Center, etc.
2. The first data collection gathers information on the data source's current configuration state. Netwrix
Auditor uses this information as a benchmark to collect data on changes to the audited environment.
After the first data collection has finished, an email notification is sent to the specified recipients
stating that the analysis has completed.
For monitoring SharePoint farms and User Activity, Netwrix Auditor employs a different data
collection method. It requires a Core Service to be installed on the monitored computers/SharePoint
server. The Core Service starts collecting data immediately and does not require to run the first data
collection to gather information on the data source's current configuration state. See See Network
Traffic Compression for more information.
3. For all data sources, the latest data collection status can be reviewed in any Netwrix Auditor client,
remote or installed along with Netwrix Auditor Server. To do it, navigate to the monitoring plan which
includes the data source whose data collection status you want to check. Review data collection
status in the Status column. The status is updated automatically every time you navigate to the
monitoring plan page.
4. For most data sources, collected data is uploaded to the Audit Database every 10-30 minutes. After
this period, it becomes available for search and reporting.
5. If a critical action is detected or a threshold is reached, an email notification—an alert—is sent to the
specified recipients. Make sure you enabled one of the predefined alerts or configured your custom
alerts. The alerts that are included in Behavior Anomalies assessment, appear in the Behavior
Anomalies dashboard.
6. Typically, the product generates and sends an Activity Summary once a day (by default, 3 AM). The
notification lists all activity that occurred during this period.
7. If the state-in-time functionality is enabled, Netwrix Auditor also writes a state-in-time snapshot of
the data source's current state to the Audit Database. Typically, the full snapshot is written once a
day, along with Activity Summary delivery and updated several times a day.
NOTE: This functionality is currently available for the following data sources:
l Active Directory
l File Servers
l SharePoint
l Windows Server
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l Group Policy
l SharePoint Online
l Exchange Online
NOTE: Not applicable to Netwrix Auditor for User Activity. For this data source, the product sends real-time
data about sessions and activity.
l An Activity Summary email will be generated and sent to the specified recipients. It will list all changes
that occurred since the last scheduled or on-demand Activity Summary delivery.
l Changes that occurred between data collections will be written to the Long-Term Archive and the
Audit Database, and become available in the Netwrix Auditor client.
NOTE: Depending on the size of the monitored environment and the number of changes, data collection
may take a while.
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NOTE: Notifications on user activity and event log collection (Event Log Collection Status) are a bit different
and do not show changes.
The following Activity Summary example applies to Active Directory. Other Activity Summaries generated
and delivered by Netwrix Auditor will vary slightly depending on the data source.
The example Activity Summary provides the following information on Active Directory changes:
Column Description
Action Shows the type of action that was performed on the object.
l Added
l Removed
l Modified
Object Type Shows the type of the modified AD object, for example, 'user'.
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Column Description
Item Shows the item associated with the selected monitoring plan.
Where Shows the name of the domain controller where the change was made.
Who Shows the name of the account under which the change was made.
Workstation Shows the name / IP address of the computer where the user was logged on when
the change was made.
Details Shows the before and after values of the modified AD object.
To initiate an on-demand Activity Summary delivery, navigate to the Monitoring Plans section, select a
plan, click Edit, and then select Update . A summary will be delivered to the specified reciptient, listing all
activity that occurred since the last data collection.
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7. Intelligence
7. Intelligence
Besides notifying about the changes on a daily basis, Netwrix Auditor brings security intelligence into your
IT infrastructure and enables complete visibility.
The technology works as follows: Netwrix Auditor can be configured to write collected audit trails to the
SQL-based Audit Database and the file-based Long-Term Archive. Netwrix Auditor uses data stored in the
Audit Database to generate reports, trigger alerts, and run data searches.
The product provides a variety of predefined reports for each data source that help you keep track of all
changes in your IT infrastructure and validate compliance with various standards and regulations (FISMA,
HIPAA, PCI, SOX, etc.). Friendly, interactive search interface allows users to run custom search queries, while
alerts keep them notified on critical changes.
To review intelligence data, you must be assigned the Global administrator or Global reviewer role in the
product, or the Reviewer role on the monitoring plan. See Role-Based Access and Delegation for more
information.
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7. Intelligence
NOTE: To employ reports, alerts, and interactive search capabilities, you must configure Audit Database
settings for each monitoring plan. Also, make sure all databases that store audit data reside on the
same default SQL Server instance. Otherwise, this data will not be available in the search results and
reports.
l Investigations
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8. Settings
8. Settings
In the Settings section, you can configure product settings, such as default SQL Server instance for Audit
Database, the Long-Term Archive location and retention period, etc. You can also review information about
the product version and your licenses. Review the following for additional information:
l General
l Audit Database
l Long-Term Archive
l Investigations
l Notifications
l Integrations
l Licenses
NOTE: You must be assigned the Global administrator role to modify Netwrix Auditor settings. See Role-
Based Access and Delegation for more information.
Normally, Audit Database settings are configured when you create a first monitoring plan. The SQL Server
instance you specified is set as default and settings are listed on the Settings → Audit Database tab.
Later, when you create other monitoring plans these settings prepopulate fields on the Audit Database
step of the wizard.
To review and update default Audit Database settings (including SQL Server, SSRS, retention settings),
navigate to Settings → Audit Database . If you have not specified the default settings before, click
Configure.
Option Description
Default SQL Server Define the default Audit Database location and connection information, etc.
settings See To configure default SQL Server settings for more information.
NOTE: Netwrix Auditor allows you to specify settings for each monitoring plan
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Option Description
Database retention Can be configured if you want audit data to be deleted automatically from your
Audit Database after a certain period of time. These settings are common and
cannot be modified for a certain plan. See To configure database retention for
more information.
SQL Server Reporting Define the Report Server URL and account used to upload data to Report
Services settings Server. These settings are common and cannot be modified for a certain plan.
See To configure SSRS settings for more information.
On the Settings → Audit Database tab, review settings and click Modify under the Default SQL Server
settings section.
Option Description
SQL Server instance Specify the name of the SQL Server instance to store audit data.
NOTE: If you have more than one Netwrix Auditor Server running in
your network, make sure to configure them to use different SQL
Server instances. The same SQL Server instance cannot be used
to store audit data collected by several Netwrix Auditor Servers.
Authentication Select the authentication type you want to use to connect to the SQL
Server instance:
l Windows authentication
User name Specify the account to be used to connect to the SQL Server instance.
On the Settings → Audit Database tab, review settings and click Modify under the Database retention
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8. Settings
section.
Option Description
Clear stale data when a Select if you want audit data to be deleted automatically from your
database retention period is Audit Database after a certain period of time.
exceeded / Set a database
retention period to clear
stale data
Store audit data in database Specify the number of months for which audit data will be stored. Data
for is deleted automatically when its retention period is over.
On the Settings → Audit Database tab, review settings and click Modify under the SQL Server
Reporting Services settings section.
Option Description
Report Server URL Specify the Report Server URL. Make sure that the resource is reachable.
Report Manager URL Specify the Report Manager URL. Make sure that the resource is
reachable.
User name Specify the account to be used to connect to SSRS. Make sure this
account is granted the Content Manager role on the Report Server.
Option Description
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8. Settings
Option Description
Write audit data to Specify the path to a local or shared folder where your audit data
will be stored. By default, it is set to "C:\ProgramData\Netwrix
Auditor\Data".
Keep audit data for (in months) Specify how long data will be stored. By default, it is set to 120
months.
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8. Settings
Option Description
for the last 4 data collections for most of the data sources (event if
the retention period is set to 0 data on SQL Server, file servers and
Windows Server changes will be stored for the last 2 data
collections, and 7 data collections for user activity).
Use custom credentials (for the Select the checkbox and provide user name and password for the
file share-based Long-Term Long-Term Archive service account.
Archive only)
NOTE: You can specify a custom account only for the Long-Term
Archive stored on a file share.
l Read attributes
l Write attributes
l Read permissions
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8. Settings
Option Description
Configure custom location of Default location for storing session recordings is set to
session recordings "\\<NetwrixAuditorServerName>\Netwrix_UAVR$". However, storing
extra files on Netwrix Auditor server may produce additional load
on it, so consider using this option to specify another location
where session recordings will be stored.
Enter UNC path to shared folder: Specify UNC path to the shared folder where user session video
recordings will be stored. You can use server name or IP address,
for example:
\\172.28.6.33\NA_UserSessions
Make sure the specified shared folder has enough capacity to store
the video files.
Retention period for the video files can be adjusted in the related
monitoring plan settings (targeted at User Activity data source);
default retention is 7 days. See User Activity for details.
NOTE: After you specify and save settings for session recordings, it
is recommended that you leave them unchanged.
Otherwise — if you change the storage location while using
Netwrix Auditor for User Activity — please be aware of
possible data loss, as Netwrix Auditor will not automatically
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8. Settings
Option Description
User name / Password Provide user name and password for the account that will be used
to store session recordings to the specified shared folder.
Make sure the account has at least Write permission for that
folder.
NOTE: Netwrix Auditor informs you if you are running out of space on a system disk where the Long-Term
Archive is stored by default. You will see events in the Netwrix Auditor System Health log once
the free disk space starts approaching minimum level. When the free disk space is less than 3 GB,
the Netwrix services responsible for audit data collection will be stopped.
8.3. Investigations
By default, the Audit Database stores data up to 180 days. Once the retention period is over, the data is
deleted from the Audit Database and becomes unavailable for reporting and search.
Depending on your company requirements you may need to investigate past incidents and browse old
data stored in the Long-Term Archive. Netwrix Auditor allows importing data from the Long-Term Archive
to a special "investigation" database. Having imported data there, you can run searches and generate
reports with your past data.
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8. Settings
NOTE: You must be assigned the Global administrator role to import investigation data. To view
investigation data, you must be assigned the Global administrator or Global reviewer role.
Option Description
SQL Server Instance Specify the name of the SQL Server instance to import your audit data
to.
NOTE: If you want to run searches and generate reports, select the
same SQL Server instance as the one specified on Settings →
Audit Database page. See Audit Database for more
information.
Authentication Select the authentication type you want to use to connect to the SQL
Server instance:
l Windows authentication
User name Specify the account to be used to connect to the SQL Server instance.
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8. Settings
3. Review your New investigation configuration. Click Configure to specify the import scope.
Option Description
From... To... Specify the time range for which you want to import past audit data.
Data sources Select data sources whose audit data you want to import to the Audit
Database.
Monitoring plans Select monitoring plans whose audit data you want to import to the
Audit Database. Netwrix Auditor lists monitoring plans that are
currently available in the product configuration.
NOTE: Select All to import audit data for all monitoring plans,
including those that were removed from the product (or
removed and then recreated with the same name—Netwrix
Auditor treats them as different monitoring plans).
4. Click Run.
8.4. Notifications
Basically, the SMTP settings are configured when you create the first monitoring plan in the New
monitoring plan wizard.
You can update notification settings at any time in the Settings → Notifications. Review the following for
additional information:
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8. Settings
Navigate to Default SMTP settings to review settings used to deliver email notifications, reports, etc., and
click Modify to adjust them if necessary.
Option Description
SMTP server Enter your SMTP server address. It can be your company's Exchange
server or any public mail server (e.g., Gmail, Yahoo).
Sender address Enter the address that will appear in the From field.
NOTE: It is recommended to click Send Test Email. The system will send
a test message to the specified email address and inform you if
any problems are detected.
SMTP authentication Select this checkbox if your mail server requires the SMTP
authentication.
Use Secure Sockets Layer Select this checkbox if your SMTP server requires SSL to be enabled.
encrypted connection (SSL)
Use implicit SSL Select this checkbox if the implicit SSL mode is used, which means that
authentication an SSL connection is established before any meaningful data is sent.
Enforce certificate validation Select this checkbox if you want to verify security certificate on every
to ensure security email transmission.
NOTE: The option is not available for auditing User Activity as well
Netwrix Auditor tools.
NOTE: You can configure Activity Summary frequency, format and delivery time for each monitoring plan
individually. See Fine-Tune Your Plan and Edit Settings for more information.
After that, you can specify the recipient who will receive product activity and health summary emails.
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l To send to multiple recipients, make sure they are added to a distribution group, and enter the
group address. Entering multiple individual addresses is not supported.
To learn more about product health, you can also navigate to the Health status tile in the main window. It
will take you to the Health Status dashboard that contains information on the product activity and
system health state. See Review Health Status Dashboard for more information.
8.5. Integrations
Netwrix Auditor Integration API—endless integration, auditing and reporting capabilities.
The Netwrix Auditor Integration API provides access to audit data collected by Netwrix Auditor through
REST API endpoints. According to the RESTful model, each operation is associated with a URL. Integration
API provides the following capabilities:
l Data in: Solidify security and meet regulatory compliance standards by enabling visibility into what is
going on in any third-party application.
l Data out : Further automate your business processes, IT security and operations workflows by
enriching third-party solutions with actionable audit data.
Netwrix Auditor Integration API is enabled by default and communicates through port 9699. Navigate to
Settings → Integrations to adjust port settings and review information about possible integrations.
Netwrix recommends adding a special data source to your monitoring plan—Netwrix API. See Netwrix API
for more information.
NOTE: In Netwrix Auditor 9.0, Netwrix has updated API schemas. Make sure to check and update your
custom scripts and add-ons.
To learn more about Integration API capabilities, refer to Netwrix Auditor Integration API Guide.
8.6. Licenses
The Licenses tab allows you to review the status of your current licenses, update them and add new
licenses. To learn about Netwrix Auditor licenses, refer to the following Netwrix Knowledge Base article:
Netwrix Auditor Licensing FAQs.
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8. Settings
1. Click Update.
l Select Load from file, click Browse and point to a license file received from your sales
representative.
l Select Enter manually and type in your company name, license count and license codes.
1. Create organizational units within audited domains and add there service accounts you want to
exclude from license count.
2. On the computer where Netwrix Auditor Server resides, navigate to Netwrix Auditor installation
folder\Netwrix Auditor\Administrative Console and locate MSP.xml.
Netwrix recommends you to assign a unique identifier for each client. This information is stored
in the Netwrix Partner Portal and helps you identify each instance when you invoice customers
for Netwrix services.
NOTE: Netwrix gathers the following information about MSP licenses: identifier, license key and
license count.
l ServiceAccount Path—Is a path to OU that contains service accounts. You can add several
OUs to MSP.xml, one per line.
For example:
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NOTE: MSP.xml file must be formatted in accordance with XML standard. If company name (used as
identifier) or service account path includes & (ampersand), " (double quotes) or ' (single quotes), <
(less than), > (greater than) symbols, they must be replaced with corresponding HTML entities.
Netwrix recommends avoiding special characters since some web browsers (e.g., Internet
Explorer 8) have troubles processing them.
& &
" "
' '
< <
> >
NOTE: You must run Netwrix.NAC.MSPTool.exe every time you update MSP.xml.
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Option Description
Check for updates automatically and Netwrix Auditor periodically checks for updates so you don’t
show notifications about new product have to. When an update is available, a user is immediately
versions noticed.
Getting Help Click the link to visit Netwrix Auditor Help Center and access
user guidelines online.
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l When issues encountered during data collection, click Details... in the Status column and select View
Health Log.
OR
l In the main screen, in the Configuration section click the Health status tile, then in the Health log
dashboard widget click Open health log. See Health Log for more information.
NOTE: You can also inspect the log in the Event Viewer.
Warning An event that is not necessarily significant, but may indicate a possible
future problem. For example, the product failed to process a domain
controller.
Error An event that indicates a significant problem such as loss of data or loss of
functionality. For example, the product failed to retrieve settings for your
data source.
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If you want to monitor Netwrix Auditor health status in more depth, you can do the following:
l Create a monitoring plan for this log using Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager too to collect activity
data. See Create Monitoring Plan for Netwrix Auditor System Health Log for more information.
l Configure alerts triggered by specific events in the product's health log. See Create Alerts on Netwrix
Auditor Server Health Status for more information.
For greater usability, to depict overall product health state, the email includes a color indicator in the
topmost section: green means Netwrix Auditor had no issues while auditing your IT infrastructure, and red
means there were some problems that require your attention.
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NOTE: The Monitoring Overview section of the email provides detail information only for the monitoring
plans with issues. Successfully completed monitoring plans are not included.
To view the dashboard, on the main Netwrix Auditor page, click the Health status tile located in the
Configuration section.
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l The Activity records by date chart—Shows the number of activity records produced by your data
sources, collected and saved by Netwrix Auditor during the last 7 days. See Activity Records Statistics
for details.
l The Monitoring overview widget—Shows aggregated statistics on the statuses of all monitoring
plans configured in Netwrix Auditor at the moment. See Monitoring Overview for details.
l The Health log chart—Shows the statistics on the events written in the Netwrix Auditor health log in
the last 24 hours. Click the link in this widget to view the log. See Health Log for details.
l The Database statistics widget—Helps you to estimate database capacity on the default SQL Server
instance that hosts the product databases. See Database Statistics for details.
l The Long-Term Archive widget—Helps you to estimate the capacity of the Long-Term Archive file-
based storage. To modify its settings, including location and retention, click the link in this widget. See
Long-Term Archive Capacity for details.
l The Working Folder widget—Helps you to estimate the capacity of the Netwrix Auditor working
folder used to keep operational information (configuration files of the product components, log files,
and other data) on the Netwrix Auditor Server. See Netwrix Auditor Working Folder for details.
You can also instruct Netwrix Auditor to forward similar statistics as a health summary email to personnel
in charge. For that, click Notification settings, then follow the steps described in the Notifications section.
See also Netwrix Auditor Health Summary Email.
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After you click View details, the Activity Records Statistics window will be displayed.
By default, statistics on activity records processing is grouped by Monitoring plan and presented for the
Last 7 days. To modify the timeframe, use the drop-down list in the upper right corner.
Other fields provide the following information: data source that produces activity records, with date and
time of the last collected record, and the overall number of records collected and uploaded to the
corresponding Audit database during the specified timeframe.
NOTE: If the data sources processed by a monitoring plan did not produce any activity records during the
specified timeframe, this monitoring plan will not appear in the list.
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l Ready (green indicator)—The monitoring plans (one or several) successfully processed the data
sources with all their items and are ready for the next run.
l Pay attention (yellow indicator)—The monitoring plans (one or several) require your attention, as
some items were not processed completely but only partially. This status applies to the monitoring
plans targeted at Logon Activity and Windows File Server. See the table below for details.
l Take action (red indicator)—Any data source or item in the monitoring plan (one or several) was
processed with errors.
After you click View details, the Monitoring Overview window will be displayed.
It provides the hierarchical list of monitoring plans, processed data sources and corresponding items with
their current status and date/time of the last data processing session. For data sources and items their
current status is depicted as follows:
Data source Disabled A data source can be disabled manually via its
settings (by switching Monitor this data source
and collect activity data to OFF), or
automatically, if the license is not valid any more
(for example, the count of licensed objects was
exceeded, or the trial period has expired).
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yet.
Item Pay attention The item was processed with some issues (non-
critical). This status applies to the monitoring
plans targeted at Logon Activity and Windows
File Server. It means that data collection from at
least one entity completed with errors.
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You can use the Search field, or apply a filter to display the information you need. For example, in the
Apply Filters dialog you can select the Show only plans with issues to display only the monitoring plans
that require attention and corrective actions.
This information will help you to troubleshoot the product operation, detect and eliminate the root cause
of the monitoring errors, providing for auditing continuity and compliance.
After you click View details , the following information will be displayed for the specified SQL Server
instance:
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The Database name column contains the list of Netwrix Auditor databases hosted by the specified
instance of the SQL Server:
l Special databases are created automatically on the default SQL Server instance to store:
o alerts—Netwrix_AlertsDB database
l To store data from the data sources included in the monitoring plan, dedicated Audit databases are
created and named by user (default name format is Netwrix_Auditor_<monitoring_plan_name>)
l Activity records—number of the activity records stored in the database at the moment
After you expand the database node, the detailed database properties will be shown:
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Unlimited
State description
Capacity error Database is running low on disk space.
-OR-
Failed to store data Failed to store data to the database due to some
issues.
Monitoring plans <monitoring_plan> All monitoring plans for which this database is a
target.
You can use the Search field, or apply a filter to display the information you need. For example, in the
Apply Filters dialog you can select the Show only plans with issues to display only the monitoring plans
that require attention and corrective actions.
This information will help you to troubleshoot the product operation, detect and eliminate the root cause
of the monitoring errors, providing for auditing continuity and compliance.
To open the Long-Term Archive settings, click the corresponding link. Then you will be able to adjust the
settings as necessary.
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In busy environments and during activity peaks, working folder size may grow significantly. To track the
working folder capacity, use the Working Folder widget.
NOTE: If you need to change the working folder location, follow the instructions provided in this
Knowledge Base article.
All Netwrix Auditor self audit Activity Records can be found quickly using AuditIntelligence Search.
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NOTE: Having reviewed your results, apply filters to narrow your data. See Apply Filters for more
information.
After browsing your data, navigate to Tools to use the search results as intended. See Make
Search Results Actionable for more information.
Also, there is a new Netwrix Auditor Self-Audit report available under Organization Level Reports in the
predefined set of reports. This report shows detailed information on changes to Netwrix Auditor
monitoring plans, data sources and audited items. Use this report to ensure that the scope of data to be
audited is complete and all changes are in line with the workflows adopted by your organization.
1. On the main Netwrix Auditor page, select the Health status tile, then in the Health log dashboard
widget click Open health log.
2. Select an entry to review it in details. You can also copy event details. Select the event in the list and
click Copy details at the bottom of the window.
For your convenience, Netwrix Auditor provides you with filters so that you can narrow down the number
of events on the screen and focus on those that matter most. For example, warnings on failed data
collection or events of an important monitoring plan.
To filter events
1. Select Filters in the upper part of the Netwrix Auditor Health Log window.
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Option Description
Logged Specify event logging time period (date range, yesterday, etc.).
Event level Select level of the events that you want to be displayed.
Event source Select services and applications whose events you want to view.
Monitoring plan Select to display events from one or several monitoring plans.
Item name Select to display events from the certain item(s) you need.
Event ID Enter event ID number or range of event IDs separated by commas. For
example, 1, 3, 5-99.
NOTE: You can also exclude unwanted event IDs from being displayed. Type
the minus sign before selected event ID. For example, -76.
The applied filters will be listed on the top of the screen under the window title.
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l Checks the managed domain or specific organizational units by inquiring all domain controllers, and
sends reports to managers and system administrators listing all accounts that have been inactive for
the specified number of days.
2. On the main page, you will be prompted to select a monitoring plan. Click Add to add a new
monitoring plan.
Option Description
Enable inactive user tracking Select the checkbox to discover inactive users in your
Active Directory domain.
Send report to administrators Enable this option and specify one or several email
addresses for administrators to receive daily reports
with a list of inactive users . Use semicolon to
separate several addresses.
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Option Description
Specify account which will be used to Enter the account which will be used for data
collect data: collection.
l User name For a full list of the rights and permissions this
account, and instructions on how to configure them,
l Password
refer to Netwrix Auditor Installation and
Configuration Guide.
Consider user inactive after Specify account inactivity period, after which a user is
considered to be inactive.
Customize the report template Click Edit to edit the notification template, for
example, modify the text of the message. You can
use HTML tags when editing a template.
Attach report as a CSV files Select this option to receive reports attached to
emails as CSV files.
Option Description
Notify manager after Specify account inactivity period, after which the
account owner's manager must be notified.
Set random password after Specify account inactivity period, after which a
random password will be set for this account.
Disable accounts after Specify account inactivity period, after which the
account will be disabled.
Delete accounts after Specify account inactivity period, after which the
account will be removed.
Delete account with all its subnodes Select this checkbox to delete an account that is a
container for objects.
Notify managers only once If this checkbox is selected, managers receive one
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Option Description
Option Description
Filter by account name Specify one or several user account names (e.g.,
*John*). Use semicolon to separate several names.
Only user accounts that contain selected name will
be notified and included in the administrators and
managers reports.
Option Description
SMTP server Enter your SMTP server address. It can be your company's
Exchange server or any public mail server (e.g., Gmail, Yahoo).
Sender address Enter the address that will appear in the From field.
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Option Description
SMTP authentication Select this checkbox if your mail server requires the SMTP
authentication.
Use Secure Sockets Layer Select this checkbox if your SMTP server requires SSL to be
encrypted connection (SSL) enabled.
Use implicit SSL connection Select this checkbox if the implicit SSL mode is used, which means
mode that an SSL connection is established before any meaningful data is
sent.
1. Click Generate next to Generate report on inactive users to view report immediately.
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2. On the main page, you will be prompted to select a monitoring plan. Click Add to add a new
monitoring plan.
Option Description
Enable password expiration alerting Select the checkbox to discover expiring passwords
in your Active Directory domain.
Send report to administrators Enable this option and specify one or several email
addresses for administrators to receive daily reports
with a list of users whose accounts/passwords are
going to expire in the specified number of days. Use
semicolon to separate several addresses.
Option Description
Specify account which will be used to Enter the account which will be used for data
collect data: collection.
l User name For a full list of the rights and permissions this
account, and instructions on how to configure them,
l Password
refer to Netwrix Auditor Installation and
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Option Description
Configuration Guide.
Filter users by organizational unit To audit users for expiring accounts/passwords that
belong to certain organizational units within your
Active Directory domain, select this option and click
Select OUs. In the dialog that opens, specify the OUs
that you want to audit. Only users belonging to these
OUs will be notified and included in the
administrators and managers reports.
Filter by account name Specify one or several user account names (e.g.,
*John*). Use semicolon to separate several names.
Only user accounts that contain selected name will
be notified and included in the administrators and
managers reports.
Option Description
Send report to the users’ managers Enable this option to deliver reports to the user’s
managers.
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Option Description
List users whose accounts or passwords Specify the expiration period for accounts and/or
expire in <> days or less passwords to be included in the administrators and
managers reports.
Only report on users with expiring Select this option to deliver reports on users with
accounts expiring accounts only and ignore users whose
passwords will be valid for a rather long time.
Every day if password expires in <> days Select this option for users to be notified daily that
or less their passwords are going to expire, and specify the
number of days before the expiration date.
First/Second/Last time when password Select this option for users to be notified three times,
expires in <> days and specify the number of days before the expiration
date for each of three notifications.
Notify users by email every day if their Select this option for users to be notified daily that
accounts expire in <> days their account is going to expire, and specify the
number of days before the expiration date.
Notify users by text messages Select this option for users to receive text messages if
their passwords are about to expire. To edit
SMS Notifications template, click Customize.
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Option Description
Option Description
SMTP server Enter your SMTP server address. It can be your company's
Exchange server or any public mail server (e.g., Gmail, Yahoo).
Sender address Enter the address that will appear in the From field.
SMTP authentication Select this checkbox if your mail server requires the SMTP
authentication.
Use Secure Sockets Layer Select this checkbox if your SMTP server requires SSL to be
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Option Description
Use implicit SSL connection Select this checkbox if the implicit SSL mode is used, which means
mode that an SSL connection is established before any meaningful data is
sent.
Display the following From Enter the address that will appear in the " From " field in email
address in email notifications.
notifications
NOTE: This option does not affect notifications sent to users'
managers and administrators. Before configuring the
"From" field for user email notifications, make sure that your
Exchange supports this option.
Option Description
Modify scheduled task start time The default start time of the scheduled task is 3.00
AM every day. Click Modify to configure custom
schedule.
Customize the report template Click Customize to edit the notification template, for
example, modify the text of the message. You can
use HTML tags when editing a template.
Attach reports as a CSV files Select this option to receive reports attached to
emails as CSV files.
Ignore users who must change password Select this option to exclude users who must change
at next logon password at next logon from reports.
Ignore users with the " Password never Select this option to exclude users with the
expires" option enabled " Password never expires " option enabled from
reports.
Ignore users who do not have email Select this option to exclude users who do not have
accounts email accounts from reports.
Ignore users whose passwords have Select this option to exclude users whose passwords
already expired have already expired from reports.
Include data on expiring accounts Select this option to include data on expiring domain
accounts further to expiring passwords information.
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Option Description
Only report on users with fine- grained Select this option to include in reports only users
password policies applied who have fine-grained policies applied.
Click Generate next to Generate report on users with expired account or passwords to view report
on users passwords immediately. In the Maximum Password Age Setting dialog that opens, select
domain policy settings or specify the maximum password age in days.
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2. On the main page, you will be prompted to select a monitoring plan. Click Add to add new plan.
l Enable event log collection—Select the checkbox to start monitoring event logs.
l Notification recipients—Specify one or several email addresses for users to receive daily Event
Log collection status notifications. Use semicolon to separate several addresses.
l Monitored computers—Select items that you want to audit. You can add several items to your
monitoring plan. Click Add and complete the following:
Option Description
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Option Description
IP address range / Computers within Allows specifying an IP range for the audited
an IP range computers.
NOTE: You can specify multiple computer names by importing a list from a .txt file (one computer
name/IP address per line is accepted). Click Import and select a .txt file. You can choose
whether to import the list once, or to update it on every data collection.
Option Description
User name Enter the account that will be used by Netwrix Auditor Event Log
Manager for data collection. For a full list of the rights and permissions
Password
required for the account, and instructions on how to configure them,
refer to Netwrix Auditor Installation and Configuration Guide.
Audit archiving filters Define what events will be saved to the Long-Term Archive or the
Audit Database. Refer to Configure Audit Archiving Filters for Event
Log for detailed instructions on how to configure audit archiving
filters.
Option Description
SMTP server Enter your SMTP server address. It can be your company's
Exchange server or any public mail server (e.g., Gmail, Yahoo).
Sender address Enter the address that will appear in the From field.
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Option Description
SMTP authentication Select this checkbox if your mail server requires the SMTP
authentication.
Use Secure Sockets Layer Select this checkbox if your SMTP server requires SSL to be
encrypted connection (SSL) enabled.
Use implicit SSL connection Select this checkbox if the implicit SSL mode is used, which means
mode that an SSL connection is established before any meaningful data is
sent.
5. Navigate to the Audit Database tab to configure Audit Database and review SQL Server settings.
Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager synchronizes Audit Database and reports settings with the
default Audit Database configuration from Netwrix Auditor Server. If this option is disabled, contact
your Netwrix Auditor Global administrator and make sure that these settings are properly configured
in Netwrix Auditor Server. Refer to Audit Database for detailed instructions on how to configure the
Audit Database settings.
Option Description
Write data to Audit Select if you want to generate reports. Even if you do not select this
Database and enable checkbox now, you will still be able to configure these settings later,
reports but already collected audit data will not be imported in the Audit
Database.
Write event descriptions Select if you want to see the exact error or warning text.
to Audit Database
Store events for... days Specify the Audit Database retention period.
NOTE: This setting affects all monitoring plans. The minimum value
specified across the plans will be applied. When configuring,
mind that your data will be deleted automatically when its
retention period is over.
NOTE: You cannot edit SQL Server settings for Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager.
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Option Description
Specify notification Modify the Event Log collection status email delivery schedule.
delivery time
The Event Log Collection Status email shows whether data collection for your monitoring plan completed
successfully or with warnings and errors.
The product allows creating inclusive and exclusive audit archiving filters.
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l To create or modify an audit archiving filter, see To create or edit an audit archiving filter.
l To collect events required to generate a specific report, you must select a filter which name coincides
with this report’s name. Click Enable and select Filters for Reports. All filters required to store events
for all available reports will be selected automatically.
1. On the Audit archiving filters page, click Add or select a filter and click Edit.
Option Description
Event Log Select an event log from the drop-down list. You will be alerted on
events from this event log. You can also input a different event log.
Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager does not collect the Analytic and
Debug logs, so you cannot configure alerts for these logs.
NOTE: You can use a wildcard (*). For inclusive filters: all Windows logs
except for the ones mentioned above will be saved. For
exclusive: all Windows logs events will be excluded.
Write to/Don't write to Select the location to write/not to write events to, depending on the
filter type (inclusive or exclusive).
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Option Description
Event ID Enter the identifier of a specific event that you want to be save. You
can add several IDs separated by comma.
Event Level Select the event types that you want to be save. If the Event Level
check box is cleared, all event types will be saved.
l * - any machine
User Enter a user’s name. Only events created by this user will be saved.
NOTE: If you need to specify several users, you can define a mask for
this parameter in the same way as described above.
Source Specify this parameter if you want to save events from a specific
source. Input the event source as it is displayed in the Source field in
the event properties.
NOTE: If you need to specify several sources, you can define a mask
for this parameter in the same way as described above.
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Option Description
Category Specify this parameter if you want to save a specific events category.
Consider the following Specify this parameter if you want to store events containing a specific
event Insertion Strings string in the EventData. You can use a wildcard (*). Click Add and
specify Insertion String.
NOTE: You can also review and filter Netwrix Auditor health events right in the product. See Netwrix
Auditor System Health Log for more information.
NOTE: The procedure below describes the basic steps, required for creation of the monitoring plan that will
be used to collect data on Netwrix Auditor health status events. See Create Monitoring Plans for
Event Logs for more information.
1. Start Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager and create the new monitoring plan.
2. Make sure that the Enable event log collection checkbox is selected. Specify the name for the new
monitoring plan, for example, "Netwrix Auditor Health Status".
3. Navigate to the Monitored computers list and add a server where the Netwrix Auditor Server
resides.
NOTE: Navigate to the Audit Database tab and select Write event descriptions to Audit
Database if you want to see the exact error or warning text. Make sure that Audit Database
settings are configured properly. See Audit Database for more information.
4. Click Configure next to Audit archiving filters and select the Netwrix Auditor System Health Log
filter in the Inclusive Filters list.
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2. On the Alert Properties step, specify the alert name and enter alert description (optional). Specify
the number alerts per email. Grouped alerts for different computers will be delivered in separate
email messages. This value is set to 1 by default, which means that each alert will be delivered as a
separate email message.
3. On the Notifications step, configure email notifications and customize the notification template, if
needed. Click Edit next to Customize notifications template . Edit the template by deleting or
inserting information fields.
NOTE: The %ManagedObjectName% variable will be replaced with your monitoring plan name.
4. On the Event filters step, specify an event that will trigger the alert.
Option Description
Event Log Select an event log from the drop-down list. You will be alerted
on events from this event log. You can also input a different
event log.
Netwrix Auditor does not collect the Analytic and Debug logs,
so you cannot configure alerts for these logs.
NOTE: You can use a wildcard (*). In this case you will be alerted
on events from all Windows logs except for the ones
mentioned above.
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Option Description
Event Level Select the event types that you want to be alerted on. If the
Event Level checkbox is cleared, you will be alerted on all event
types of the specified log.
Computer Specify a computer. You will only be alerted on events from this
computer.
l * - any machine
User Enter a user’s name. You will be alerted only on the events
generated under this account.
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Option Description
Consider the following event Insertion Specify this parameter if you want to receive alerts
Strings on events containing a specific string in the
EventData. You can use a wildcard (*). Click Add and
specify Insertion String.
5. Click OK to save the changes and close the Event Filters dialog.
NOTE: The procedure below describes the basic steps, required for creation of the monitoring plan that will
be used to collect data on Netwrix Auditor health status events. See Create Monitoring Plans for
Event Logs for more information.
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1. Start Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager and create the new monitoring plan.
2. Make sure that the Enable event log collection checkbox is selected. Specify the name for the new
plan, for example, "Netwrix Auditor Health Status".
3. Navigate to the Monitored computers list and add a server where the Netwrix Auditor Server
resides.
4. On the General tab, click Configure next to Alerts. Make sure the predefined alerts are disabled.
Click Add to create anew alert.
5. In the Alert Properties wizard, specify the alert name and enter alert description (optional). Specify
the number alerts per email. Grouped alerts for different computers will be delivered in separate
email messages. This value is set to 1 by default, which means that each alert will be delivered as a
separate email message.
NOTE: Specify alert recipient if you want the alert to be delivered to a non-default email.
6. Navigate to Event Filters and click Add to specify an event that will trigger the alert.
l In the Event tab, specify the filter name and description. In the Event Log field select the
Netwrix Auditor log.
l In the Event Fields tab, select event levels that will trigger the alert.
Click OK to save the changes and close the Event Filters dialog.
8. In the Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager wizard, navigate to Notifications section and specify
the email address where notifications will be delivered.
NOTE: It is recommended to click Verify. The system will send a test message to the specified email
address and inform you if any problems are detected.
9. In the Audit Archiving filters, select the Netwrix Auditor System Health as the inclusive filter.
10. Click Save to save your changes. If an event occurs that triggers an alert, an email notification will be
sent immediately to the specified recipients.
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NOTE: The procedure below describes the basic steps, required for creation of a monitoring plan that will
be used to collect data on non-owner mailbox access events. See Create Monitoring Plans for Event
Logs for more information.
2. Make sure that the Enable event log collection checkbox is selected. Specify the name for the new
plan, for example, "Non-owner mailbox access auditing".
3. Navigate to the Monitored computers list and add a server where your Exchange organization
resides.
4. On the General tab, click Configure next to Alerts. Make sure the predefined alerts are disabled.
Click Add to create an alert for non-owner mailbox access event.
5. In the Alert Properties wizard, specify the alert name and enter alert description (optional). Specify
the number alerts per email. Grouped alerts for different computers will be delivered in separate
email messages. This value is set to 1 by default, which means that each alert will be delivered as a
separate email message.
NOTE: Specify alert recipient if you want the alert to be delivered to a non-default email.
6. Navigate to Event Filters and click Add to specify an event that will trigger the alert.
l In the Event tab, specify the filter name and description. In the Event Log field enter "Netwrix
Non-Owner Mailbox Access Agent".
l Event ID—Enter the identifier of a specific event that you want to be alerted on. You can
add several IDs separated by comma. Review the event IDs available in the Netwrix Non-
Owner Mailbox Access Agent event log:
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l In the Insertion Strings tab, select Consider the following event Insertion Strings to receive
alerts on events containing a specific string in the EventData. Click Add and specify Insertion
String.
Click OK to save the changes and close the Event Filters dialog.
8. In the Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager wizard, navigate to Notifications section and specify
the email address where notifications will be delivered.
NOTE: It is recommended to click Verify. The system will send a test message to the specified email
address and inform you if any problems are detected.
9. Click Edit next to Audit Archiving Filters step, in the Inclusive Filters section clear the filters you do
not need, click Add and specify the following information:
l The filter name and description (e.g., Non-owner mailbox access event)
l In Write to, select Long-Term Archive. The events will be saved into the local repository.
10. Click Save to save your changes. If an event occurs that triggers an alert, an email notification will be
sent immediately to the specified recipients.
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Depending on the event, the strings in the description may vary. The first eight strings are common for all
events:
String Description
String2 The event date and time in the following format: YYYY_MM_DD_hh_mm_ss_000
String6 Shows whether the user accessing mailbox is the owner: it is always false
The following strings depend on the non-owner access type, represented by different Event IDs:
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10 actFolderMoveCopy Strings 9 -13 The string descriptions for the folder are
similar to those for messages.
NOTE: With different Exchange versions and/or different email clients, the same non-owner action (e.g.,
copying a message) may generate different events: e.g., actMessageMoveCopy with one
server/client or actMessageCreatedAndSaved with another.
You can add the required strings contained in % symbols for your own custom alert separated by a <br>
tag in <b>Event Parameters:</b>. Event parameter descriptions can also be added.
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1. On the main Netwrix Auditor Event Log Manager page, click View next to View collected events.
2. In the Netwrix Auditor Event Viewer window, complete the following to narrow results:
Option Description
Monitoring plan Select the monitoring plan that audits desired event log
entries.
From... To... Specify the time range for which you want to retrieve
past audit data.
2. Select a monitoring plan and the time range for which you want to import data.
3. Click Import.
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Restore for Active Directory tool, it rolls back a membership in domain and sets random passwords
which then have to be changed manually. If you want to be able to restore AD objects with their passwords
preserved, you must modify the Schema container settings so that account passwords are retained when
accounts are being deleted.
NOTE: To perform this procedure, you will need the ADSI Edit utility. In Windows Server 2008 and above,
this component is installed together with the AD DS role, or it can be downloaded and installed
along with Remote Server Administration Tools.
2. Right-click the ADSI Edit node and select Connect To. In the Connection Settings dialog, enable
Select a well-known Naming Context and select Schema from the drop-down list.
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Now you will be able to restore deleted accounts with their passwords preserved.
2. On the Select Rollback Period step, specify the period of time when the changes that you want to
revert occurred. You can either select a period between a specified date and the present date, or
between two specified dates.
3. On the Select Rollback Source step, specify the rollback source. The following restore options are
available:
Option Description
Audited domain Select a domain where changes that you want to rollback
occurred.
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Option Description
Select a state- in- time Select if you want to revert to a specific snapshot. Otherwise, the
snapshot program will automatically search for the most recent snapshot
that will cover the selected time period.
4. On the Analyzing Changes step, the product analyzes the changes made during the specified time
period. When reverting to a snapshot, the tool reviews the changes that occurred between the
specified snapshots. When restoring from a tombstone, the tool reviews all AD objects put in the
tombstone during the specified period of time.
5. On the Rollback Results step, the analysis results are displayed. Select a change to see its rollback
details in the bottom of the window. Select an attribute and click Details to see what changes will be
applied if this attribute is selected for rollback. Check the changes you want to roll back to their
previous state.
6. Wait until the tool has finished restoring the selected objects. On the last step, review the results and
click Finish to exit the wizard.
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l Customize Branding
To exclude data from the monitoring scope, perform the following procedures:
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l A wildcard (*) is supported. For example, you can use * for a class name to specify an attribute
for all classes.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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allowedpathlist.txt file.
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l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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l A wildcard (*) is supported. For example, you can use * for a class name to specify an attribute
for all classes.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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For example:
msExchSystemMailbox.*
*.msExchEdgeSyncCredential
*.msExchMailboxMoveTargetMDBLink
*.adminDescription
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For example:
Exchange_
Server.AdministrativeGroup
Exchange_
Server.AdministrativeNote
Exchange_Server.CreationTime
Netwrix Auditor allows specifying users and mailboxes that you do not want to monitor for non-owner
mailbox access events. To do this, edit the mailboxestoexclude.txt , userstoexclude.txt , and
agentomitusers.txt files.
1. Navigate to the %Netwrix Auditor installation folder%\Non-owner Mailbox Access Reporter for
Exchange folder.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
NOTE: You can also limit your reports by specific mailboxes. Edit the mailboxestoinclude.txt file to
specify mailboxes.
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File Description
mailboxestoexclude.txt This file contains a list of mailboxes and folders that must be excluded from
reports.
In the last example, the specified folder will be excluded in all mailboxes. If
the Netwrix Auditor Mailbox Access Core Service is disabled, the ‘Mailbox_
Name/Folder_Name’ lines are ignored.
mailboxestoinclude.txt This file contains a list of mailboxes that must be included to reports.
You can specify email address to be included in the list. For example,
analyst@enterprise.com.
NOTE: In this case, reports will contain only non-owner access events of the
mailboxes added to this list.
userstoexclude.txt This file contains a list of users in the DOMAIN\username format, who must
be excluded from reports if they perform non-owner access to mailboxes
(audit data on these users will still be stored in the snapshots).
If a user is removed from this list, the information on this user’s actions can
be viewed with the Report Viewer.
agentomitusers.txt This file contains a list of users in the DOMAIN\username format, who must
be excluded from reports and snapshots.
If a user is removed from this list, audit data on this user will only be
available after the next data collection. Writing new users to this file affects
reports and snapshots only if Network traffic compression is enabled.
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l A wildcard (*) is supported. You can use * for cmdlets and their parameters.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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For example:
analyst@Enterprise.onmicrosoft.com
To exclude data from Windows File Server, NetApp Filer and EMC Storage monitoring scope
l Wildcards (*, ?) are supported. For example, you can use * for a class name to specify an
attribute for all classes.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
l A backslash (\) must be put in front of (*), (?) and (,) if they are a part of an entry value.
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collected.
1. In Netwrix Auditor, navigate to your Oracle Database monitoring plan and click Edit.
4. In the Add User dialog, type name of the user you want to exclude and select its type (OS user or
Database user).
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NOTE: If you have several monitoring plans for monitoring SharePoint farms, configure omitlists for
each monitoring plan separately.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
For example:
http://sharepointsrv:3333/
For example:
https://siteColl*
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Examples:
http://siteCollection1:3333/
https://siteColl*
Examples:
*list/document.docx
*/_catalogs/*
*/_vti_inf.html
*/Style Library*
*/SitePages*
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being monitored for read NOTE: Only specify URI reference to a list or
access. list item without
https:\\<siteCollection_
name> part.
For example:
*list/document.docx
For example:
http://webApplication1:3333/
NOTE: If you have several monitoring plans for monitoring SharePoint Online, configure omitlists for
each monitoring plan separately.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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accounts account@example.*.com
to be
excluded
from read
access
monitorin
g.
OmitSitStoreList.txt Contains Enter URI (Unique resource identifier, or endpoint) reference. Note
SharePoi that URI Reference does not include site collection URL.
nt Online
For example, to exclude a list item with the
lists and https://sitecollection.sharepoint.com/list/docume
list items
nt.docx, URL, you should specify the corresponding endpoint
to be
(URI), i.e. list/document.docx.
excluded
from
state-in-
time data
collection.
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l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
For example:
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DB_M0,Ent-
SQL,SQLFailedLogon,guest,WksSQL,MyInternal
App
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the * character.
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l A wildcard (*) is supported. For example, you can use * for a class name to specify an attribute
for all classes.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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omitstorelist.txt Contains a list of objects to Monitoring plan name, who, where, object type,
be excluded from being what, property name, property value
saved to data storage and
For example, to exclude internal logons:
showing up in reports.
*,*,*,Logon,*,UserAgent,VMware vim-
NOTE: Audit data will still java*
be collected.
NOTE: The following characters must be
preceded with a backslash (\) if they are
a part of an entry value:
*
,
\
?
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l Wildcards (* and ?) are supported. A backslash (\) must be put in front of (*), (?), (,), and (\) if they
are a part of an entry value.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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For example:
*,server,MicrosoftDNS_Server
*,*,StdServerRegProv
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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2. Edit omitobjlist_ gp.txt , omitproplist_ gp.txt and omituserlist_ gp.txt files, based on the following
guidelines:
l A wildcard (*) is supported and can be used to replace any number of characters.
l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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NOTE: If you have several monitoring plans for monitoring Logon Activity, configure omitlist for each
monitoring plan separately.
l Wildcards (* and ?) are supported. A backslash (\) must be put in front of (*) and (?) if they are a
part of an entry value.
l Lines that start with <!-- are treated as comments and are ignored.
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Allows specifying a
user by name.
NOTE: The file must be formatted in accordance with XML standard. The following symbols must be
replaced with corresponding XML entities: & (ampersand), " (double quotes), ' (single quotes),
< (less than), and > (greater than) symbols.
& &
" "
' '
< <
> >
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l Lines that start with the # sign are treated as comments and are ignored.
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CleanAutoBackupLogs Defines the retention period for the security log backups:
l 0—Display errors
IgnoreRootDCErrors Defines whether to display audit check errors for the root domain
(when data is collected from a child domain) in the Activity
Summary footer:
l 0—Display errors
l 2—MAC address
l 6—Both
MonitorModifiedAndRevertedBack Defines whether the Activity Summary must display the attributes
whose values were modified and then restored between data
collections:
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
NOTE: Even if this key is set to "0" , the security log backups will
not be deleted regardless of the value of the
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CleanAutoBackupLogs key.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Netwrix Auditor\Management
Console\Database settings
SqlOperationTimeout Defines the timeout for executing SQL queries such as data
selection, insertion or deletion (in seconds).
CleanAutoBackupLogs Defines the retention period for the security log backups:
l 0—Display errors
IgnoreRootDCErrors Defines whether to display audit check errors for the root domain
(when data is collected from a child domain) in the Activity
Summary footer:
l 0—Display errors
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l 2—MAC address
l 6—Both
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
NOTE: Even if this key is set to "0" , the security log backups will
not be deleted regardless of the value of the
CleanAutoBackupLogs key.
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
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HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Netwrix Auditor\Management
Console\Database settings
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
SqlOperationTimeout Defines the timeout for executing SQL queries such as data
selection, insertion or deletion (in seconds).
Review the basic registry keys that you may need to configure for monitoring file servers with Netwrix
Auditor. Navigate to Start → Run and type "regedit".
CleanAutoBackupLogs Defines the retention period for the security log backups:
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
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NOTE: Even if this key is set to "0" , the security log backups will
not be deleted regardless of the value of the
CleanAutoBackupLogs key.
CleanAutoBackupLogs Defines the retention period for the security log backups:
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
NOTE: Even if this key is set to "0" , the security log backups will
not be deleted regardless of the value of the
CleanAutoBackupLogs key.
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CleanAutoBackupLogs Defines the retention period for the security log backups:
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
NOTE: Even if this key is set to "0" , the security log backups will
not be deleted regardless of the value of the
CleanAutoBackupLogs key.
l 0—Disabled
l 1—Enabled
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
CleanAutoBackupLogs Defines the retention period for the security log backups:
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l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—Backup always
l X—Once in X days
l 0—Display errors
IgnoreRootDCErrors Defines whether to display audit check errors for the root domain
(when data is collected from a child domain) in the Activity
Summary footer:
l 0—Display errors
l 2—MAC address
l 6—Both
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
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l 1—Yes
NOTE: Even if this key is set to "0" , the security log backups will
not be deleted regardless of the value of the
CleanAutoBackupLogs key.
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l X—Once in X days
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Netwrix Auditor\Management
Console\Database settings
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l 0—No
l 1—Yes
SqlOperationTimeout Defines the timeout for executing SQL queries such as data
selection, insertion or deletion (in seconds).
HideEmailAdditionalInfo Defines whether to show or hide the header and footer in emails
sent to users and their managers (emails sent to administrators
always have default header and footer):
l 0—Show
HideEmailAdditionalInfo Defines whether to show or hide the header and footer in emails
sent to managers (emails sent to administrators always have
default header and footer):
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l 0—Show
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
l 0—No
l 1—Yes
Users who frequently connect to different Netwrix Auditor Servers (e.g., MSP users) installed both locally
and remotely, may also leverage shortcuts to automate their sign-in process. The parameters pre-populate
the start page with connection details. For security reasons, the password must be typed by a user.
To create a shortcut that will start Netwrix Auditor client with pre-populated connection details
1. Navigate to the Netwrix Auditor client installation directory and locate the AuditIntelligence.exe (by
default, C:\Program Files (x86)\Netwrix Auditor\Audit Intelligence\AuditIntelligence.exe).
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4. In the Target field you will see a path to your executable. Add the following parameters after the
path.
/s:server_name /u:user_name /specify_creds
where:
l server_name—Replace with Netwrix Auditor Server name (computer that hosts Netwrix
Auditor Server) or its IP address.
5. Click Apply.
You can create as many shortcuts with different parameters as needed. When you click the shortcut, the
product will start with pre-populated connection details.
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1. Make sure you have full Netwrix Auditor installation: Netwrix Auditor Server and Client to enable
rebranding.
2. Since Netwrix applies company's logo as is, keep in mind reasonable limitations of your logo
dimensions. You can find examples of appropriate logo files in the rebranding archive (file Logo.png).
Re-size your logo and verify that subscriptions emails and pdf files look fine after rebranding.
4. Endure that image file is located in the default directory or custom folder. Consider the following:
l For subscription emails, just put the logo file to %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\Netwrix Auditor\Branding\
and run the script to update email look and feel.
l For exported pdf files, make sure that the logo file is located in the default directory for each
user that is going to work with exported search results, Risk Assessment and Overview
dashboards. Otherwise, specify custom path to logo file. Default path to logo for exported files is
%LOCALAPPDATA%\Netwrix Auditor\Audit Intelligence\Resources\.
To customize branding
2. Unzip the package to any folder on the computer where Netwrix Auditor Server is installed.
l Use default paths to logo files—Run the script and type your company name as the report_
title.
4. Generate any test subscription email or export a dashboard to pdf file to verify that rebranding
applied.
NOTE: To restore original look and feel, run the script and replace"True " with "False " in the "enabled "
section.
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Report branding is customized on Netwrix Auditor Server side that means that all clients connected to this
server will have the same look and feel for reports.
To customize branding
1. On the computer where Netwrix Auditor Server resides, navigate to С:\Program Data\Netwrix
Auditor\Rebranding.
2. Right-click the Rebranding.ps1 script and select Edit. Windows PowerShell ISE will start.
Parameter Description
SQLServerInstance Defines a SQL Server instance where your Audit Database resides.
By default, local unnamed instance is selected.
DBName By default, the database responsible for Netwrix Auditor look and
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Parameter Description
HeaderImageFullPath Defines a full path to the png image with the new report header
(product logo). Supported size: 21x21px (WxH).
FooterImageFullPath Defines a full path to the png image with the new report footer
(logo). Supported size: 105x22px (WxH).
FooterURL Defines URL that opens on clicking the report logo in the footer.
4. Click (Run Script). The user who runs the script is granted the db_owner role on the Netwrix_
CommonDB database.
After running the script, start the Netwrix Auditor client and generate a report. The branding will be
updated.
1. On the computer where Netwrix Auditor Server resides, navigate to the script location.
2. Right-click a script and select Edit. Windows PowerShell ISE will start.
3. Run the script as it is. The user who runs the script must be granted the db_owner role on the
Common_DB database in a local unnamed SQL Server configured as default for Netwrix Auditor.
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12. Appendix
12. Appendix
This section contains information out of the scope of Netwrix Auditor administration, but is beneficial to
Administrators to leverage full scope of the product capabilities. Review the following for additional
information:
With network traffic compression, data from the target machines is collected simultaneously, providing for
network load balance and minimizing data collection time. (Unlike that, without network traffic
compression the target machines will be processed sequentially, i.e. one at a time.) So, network traffic
compression helps to increase scalability and optimize network traffic.
l Allows Netwrix Auditor to collect detailed metrics for the servers, log files, hardware and individual
processes
l Communicates with Netwrix Auditor Server at predefined intervals, relaying data back to a central
repository for storage
l Active Directory
l Exchange
l File Servers
l EMC
l NetApp
l Windows Server
l Event Logs
l Group Policy
l Logon Activity
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12. Appendix
l SharePoint
l User Activity
To learn how to enable this feature, refer to the Settings for Data Collectionsection.
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Index
Default settings 77
AuditArchive
A
Investigations 83
Active Directory
Automate sign-in 175
Add data source 34
Azure AD
Exclude from auditing 136
Add data source 36
Registry keys 165
Exclude from auditing 139
Roll back changes 131
B
Activity Summary 73
Best practices
Advanced configuration 135
Netwrork traffic compression 180
Advanced Configuration
Branding 176
Audit archiving filters 117
Customize exported search results 176
Registry keys
Customize reports 177
Active Directory 165
Browse audit data 75
Event logs 170
C
Exchnage Server 167
Collect audit data 71
File servers 169
Customize Netwrix Auditor client
Group Policy 171
Sign-in 175
Inactive Users 174
D
Logon Activity 175
Data Collection 71
Password Expiration 174
Launch data collection manually 72
Windows Server 170
Data sources 32
Alerts 123
Active Directory 34
Event Log
Azure AD 36
Create 120
EMC 40 , 62
Mailbox Access 125
Exchange 37
API 87
Exchange Online 38
Add data source 53
Group Policy 40
Logon Activity 44
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Index
Netwrix API 53 F
SQL Server 48 G
Delegation 14 , 19 H
Exchange Domain 57
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Index
Logon Activity O
M Exchange 141
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Index
Overview 8 Integrations 87
P Investigations 83
RESTful API 87 V
Compare 15 W
S Windows Server
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