Enhancing Security Operations with Microsoft Defender XDR and Microsoft Sentinel Integration: A Bi-Directional Approach

Microsoft Defender XDR and Microsoft Sentinel are powerful tools in the modern cybersecurity landscape. Integrating them creates a robust security posture, especially crucial in environments that rely on diverse Identity Provider (IDP) solutions and bi-directionaly server communications for their operations. This article delves into the seamless integration of Microsoft Defender XDR with Microsoft Sentinel, offering a comprehensive guide to leveraging their combined strengths for enhanced threat detection, incident response, and overall security management.

Microsoft Sentinel, a cloud-native SIEM and SOAR solution, works synergistically with Microsoft Defender XDR, a unified pre- and post-breach enterprise defense suite. By connecting these platforms, organizations can stream all Defender XDR incidents and advanced hunting events directly into Microsoft Sentinel. This integration ensures that security incidents and events are consistently synchronized between the Azure and Microsoft Defender portals, providing security operations teams with a unified view and control.

Alternatively, for organizations aiming for a consolidated security experience, Microsoft Sentinel with Defender XDR can be onboarded to Microsoft’s unified security operations (SecOps) platform within the Microsoft Defender portal. This unified platform brings together the full spectrum of capabilities from Microsoft Sentinel, Defender XDR, and advanced generative AI, purpose-built for cybersecurity. This approach streamlines security workflows and enhances threat visibility across the entire digital estate.

Methods of Integration: Azure Portal vs. Microsoft Defender Portal

There are two primary methods to integrate Microsoft Sentinel with Microsoft Defender XDR services, each catering to different operational preferences and needs.

Azure Portal Integration: This method focuses on ingesting Microsoft Defender XDR service data into Microsoft Sentinel and managing security operations primarily within the Azure portal. By enabling the Defender XDR connector in Microsoft Sentinel, organizations can view and analyze Defender XDR data alongside other security information within the familiar Azure environment.
Microsoft Defender Portal Unified SecOps Platform: This approach integrates Microsoft Sentinel and Defender XDR into a single, unified security operations platform within the Microsoft Defender portal. This allows users to view Microsoft Sentinel data directly within the Microsoft Defender portal, alongside Defender incidents, alerts, vulnerabilities, and other security data. This unified experience is achieved by enabling the Defender XDR connector in Microsoft Sentinel and subsequently onboarding Microsoft Sentinel to the Microsoft Defender portal.

Choosing the right method depends on your organization’s security operations strategy and preference for managing security incidents and data.

Diagram illustrating Microsoft Sentinel and Microsoft XDR integration, showcasing data flow and analysis.

The diagram above illustrates the Azure portal integration method, depicting how signals from across an organization feed into Microsoft Defender XDR and Microsoft Defender for Cloud. These platforms then send SIEM log data through Microsoft Sentinel connectors. Security Operations (SecOps) teams can analyze and respond to identified threats within Microsoft Sentinel and Microsoft Defender XDR. Notably, Microsoft Sentinel’s architecture supports multi-cloud environments and integrates with various third-party applications and partners, enhancing its versatility.

Architecture diagram of Microsoft Sentinel and Microsoft Defender XDR integrated within the Microsoft Defender portal, emphasizing unified data ingestion and threat response.

This diagram showcases the unified SecOps platform approach in the Microsoft Defender portal. Similar to the Azure portal integration, insights from across the organization are channeled into Microsoft Defender XDR and Microsoft Defender for Cloud. Microsoft Sentinel maintains its multi-cloud support and third-party integrations. However, in this model, Microsoft Sentinel data is ingested directly into the Microsoft Defender portal, alongside other organizational data. This consolidation empowers SecOps teams to analyze and respond to threats detected by both Microsoft Sentinel and Microsoft Defender XDR from a single, unified interface within the Microsoft Defender portal.

Incident Correlation and Enhanced Alert Management

A key benefit of integrating Defender XDR with Microsoft Sentinel is the centralized visibility and management of Defender XDR incidents directly within Microsoft Sentinel. This provides a unified incident queue spanning the entire organization, enabling security teams to correlate Defender XDR incidents with incidents from other cloud and on-premises systems. This holistic view enhances incident prioritization and response efficiency.

Simultaneously, this integration allows organizations to leverage the specialized strengths of Defender XDR for in-depth investigations and a Defender-centric experience across the Microsoft 365 ecosystem. Defender XDR excels at enriching and grouping alerts from multiple Microsoft Defender products, significantly reducing the volume of alerts in the Security Operations Center (SOC) incident queue and accelerating incident resolution times.

Alerts incorporated into this integration from Microsoft Defender products and services include:

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Microsoft Defender for Identity
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps

Beyond these core components, Defender XDR also aggregates alerts from other services, expanding its threat detection coverage. The Defender XDR connector further incorporates incidents from Microsoft Defender for Cloud. To ensure comprehensive synchronization of alerts and entities from Defender for Cloud incidents, it’s essential to also enable the Defender for Cloud connector within Microsoft Sentinel. Failure to do so will result in Defender for Cloud incidents appearing empty within Microsoft Sentinel.

In addition to consolidating alerts from integrated components and services, Microsoft Defender XDR proactively generates its own alerts. It synthesizes incidents from all these alerts and seamlessly transmits them to Microsoft Sentinel, ensuring a comprehensive threat landscape view.

Common Use Cases and Practical Scenarios

Integrating Microsoft Defender XDR with Microsoft Sentinel is beneficial in numerous use cases and scenarios, optimizing security operations and incident handling:

Onboarding to Unified SecOps Platform: Streamlining security operations by onboarding Microsoft Sentinel to Microsoft’s unified SecOps platform in the Microsoft Defender portal, with the Defender XDR connector as a prerequisite.
One-Click Incident Connection: Enabling seamless, one-click connection of Defender XDR incidents, including all associated alerts and entities from Defender XDR components, directly into Microsoft Sentinel for centralized management.
Bi-directional Incident Synchronization: Facilitating bi-directional synchronization between Microsoft Sentinel and Defender XDR incidents, maintaining consistent status, ownership, and closing reasons across both platforms, enhancing collaboration and incident lifecycle management.
Leveraging Alert Grouping and Enrichment: Applying Defender XDR’s advanced alert grouping and enrichment capabilities within Microsoft Sentinel, reducing alert fatigue and accelerating time to resolution by providing contextualized and prioritized alerts.
Cross-Portal Investigation Efficiency: Enabling efficient investigations across both portals with in-context deep links between a Microsoft Sentinel incident and its corresponding Defender XDR incident, allowing analysts to seamlessly transition between platforms for detailed analysis.

Connecting Microsoft Defender XDR to Microsoft Sentinel

Establishing the connection between Microsoft Defender XDR and Microsoft Sentinel is a straightforward process, enhancing your security infrastructure.

To initiate the integration, enable the Microsoft Defender XDR connector within Microsoft Sentinel. This connector is responsible for transmitting all Defender XDR incidents and alert information to Microsoft Sentinel, ensuring continuous synchronization.

Install the Microsoft Defender XDR Solution: Begin by installing the Microsoft Defender XDR solution for Microsoft Sentinel from the Content hub. This solution package provides necessary components for integration.
Enable the Data Connector: Activate the Microsoft Defender XDR data connector to commence the collection of incidents and alerts. Detailed instructions can be found in the documentation on Connect data from Microsoft Defender XDR to Microsoft Sentinel.

Post-connector activation, Defender XDR incidents will promptly appear in the Microsoft Sentinel incidents queue shortly after their generation in Defender XDR. The delay is minimal, typically up to 10 minutes from incident creation in Defender XDR to its visibility in Microsoft Sentinel. These integrated incidents are identifiable by the Alert product name field, which will specify Microsoft Defender XDR or the name of the originating Defender component service.

For organizations opting for the unified SecOps platform, the final step is to Connect Microsoft Sentinel to the Microsoft Defender portal, completing the integration into a single pane of glass.

Understanding Ingestion Costs

A significant advantage of this integration is the cost-effectiveness concerning core security data. Alerts and incidents originating from Defender XDR, including the data populating the SecurityAlert and SecurityIncident tables, are ingested into and synchronized with Microsoft Sentinel without incurring additional charges. However, it’s important to note that ingestion charges apply to other data types from individual Defender components, such as advanced hunting tables like DeviceInfo, DeviceFileEvents, and EmailEvents.

For comprehensive details on pricing, refer to Plan costs and understand Microsoft Sentinel pricing and billing.

Data Ingestion Dynamics

Upon enabling the Defender XDR connector, alerts generated by Defender XDR-integrated products are directed to Defender XDR for initial processing and grouping into incidents. Subsequently, both the alerts and the consolidated incidents are channeled to Microsoft Sentinel via the Defender XDR connector.

An exception to this standard process is Microsoft Defender for Cloud. Organizations have the flexibility to choose between tenant-based Defender for Cloud alerts, routing all alerts and incidents through Defender XDR, or maintaining subscription-based alerts and promoting them to incidents within Microsoft Sentinel in the Azure portal.

Further details on available options and configurations can be found in the relevant Microsoft documentation.

Microsoft Incident Creation Rules and Integration

To prevent the creation of duplicate incidents for identical alerts, the Microsoft incident creation rules setting is automatically disabled for Defender XDR-integrated products upon establishing the connection. This is crucial because Defender XDR-integrated products, including Microsoft Defender for Identity and Microsoft Defender for Office 365, already have built-in incident creation logic. Furthermore, Microsoft incident creation rules are not supported within the Defender portal, as it possesses its native incident creation engine. This adjustment is designed to optimize incident management and prevent redundancy.

Working with Defender XDR Incidents and Bi-Directional Synchronization

Defender XDR incidents are seamlessly integrated into the Microsoft Sentinel incidents queue, identified by the product name Microsoft Defender XDR. These incidents mirror the details and functionality of standard Microsoft Sentinel incidents and include a direct link back to the parallel incident within the Microsoft Defender portal, facilitating easy cross-referencing.

As incidents evolve within Defender XDR, with the addition of more alerts or entities, the corresponding Microsoft Sentinel incident is dynamically updated in real-time. This bi-directional synchronization extends to changes in status, closing reasons, or assignments of Defender XDR incidents. Modifications made in either Defender XDR or Microsoft Sentinel are immediately reflected in the other platform’s incident queue, ensuring data consistency and collaborative incident management. While the synchronization is immediate, a manual refresh might be necessary to view the latest updates in the interface.

Defender XDR’s capability to merge incidents by transferring alerts between them is also reflected in Microsoft Sentinel. When incidents are merged in Defender XDR, the corresponding Microsoft Sentinel incidents are updated to reflect this change. One incident will consolidate all alerts from the original incidents, while the other is automatically closed and tagged as “redirected,” maintaining accurate incident representation across both platforms.

It’s important to note that Microsoft Sentinel incidents have a limit of 150 alerts per incident. Defender XDR incidents can exceed this limit. When a Defender XDR incident with over 150 alerts synchronizes to Microsoft Sentinel, the Microsoft Sentinel incident will indicate “150+” alerts and provide a direct link to the parallel incident in Defender XDR, where the complete set of alerts can be viewed.

Advanced Hunting Event Collection for Deep Dive Analysis

The Defender XDR connector extends its capabilities beyond incident synchronization to include streaming advanced hunting events. This feature allows organizations to ingest raw event data from Defender XDR and its component services directly into Microsoft Sentinel. By collecting advanced hunting events from all Defender XDR components, organizations can stream this data into purpose-built tables within their Microsoft Sentinel workspace. These tables utilize the same schema as in the Defender portal, providing comprehensive access to the full spectrum of advanced hunting events.

This capability unlocks several powerful functionalities:

Query Portability: Seamlessly migrate existing Microsoft Defender for Endpoint/Office 365/Identity/Cloud Apps advanced hunting queries into Microsoft Sentinel, preserving investment in query development and analytical workflows.
Enhanced Insight and Correlation: Leverage raw event logs to enrich alerts, hunting, and investigations, correlating these granular events with data from other diverse sources within Microsoft Sentinel for deeper contextual understanding.
Extended Data Retention: Store logs with extended retention periods beyond Defender XDR’s or its components’ default 30-day retention. This can be achieved by configuring workspace retention or setting per-table retention policies in Log Analytics, supporting long-term analysis and compliance requirements.

Conclusion: Strengthening Security with Integrated Solutions

Integrating Microsoft Defender XDR with Microsoft Sentinel represents a significant enhancement to an organization’s security operations, especially in complex environments involving diverse systems and bi-directionaly server interactions. This integration not only streamlines incident management and response but also leverages the unique strengths of both platforms. By providing a unified view of security incidents, enriching alerts, and enabling deep-dive analysis through advanced hunting data, this integration empowers security teams to proactively defend against evolving threats and optimize their overall security posture. The bi-directional server synchronization ensures data consistency and collaborative workflows, making it an indispensable component of a modern, robust security strategy.