Configure Office 365 Management APIs inputs for the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Office 365

Version 4.3.0 and higher is expected to have around 1% of event duplication for the Management Activity input in the Splunk platform due to duplicate events from the Microsoft API.

Versions 4.2.0 and higher of the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Office 365 contain changes to the checkpoint mechanism for the Management activity input. See the upgrade steps in this manual for more information.

Prerequisites: Before you enable inputs, complete the previous steps in the configuration process:

• Configure an integration application in Azure AD for the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Office 365
• Configure a Tenant in the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Office 365

Configure your inputs on the Splunk platform instance responsible for collecting data for this add-on, usually a heavy forwarder. You can configure inputs using Splunk Web (recommended) or using the configuration files.

Note:

• If you want to collect audit logs for mailbox access from Exchange Online, you need to turn on mailbox audit logging in Office 365, which is not enabled by default.
• If you configure the Office365 input for the first time, the activity log (such as Audit.Exchange, Audit.Sharepoint and Audit.AzureActivityDirectory) will subscribe the data from Microsoft side. But it will take up to 12 hours for the first content blobs to become available for that subscription in Microsoft.
• The retention period for historical data is 7 days.

Configure inputs using Splunk Web

Configure your inputs using Splunk Web on the Splunk platform instance responsible for collecting data for this add-on, usually a heavy forwarder.

1. In the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Office 365, click Inputs > Create New Input > Management Activity.




2. Enter the Input Name, Tenant Name, Content Type, Start date/time and Index using information in the input parameter table below.
3. Click Add.
4. Verify that data is successfully arriving by running the following search on your search head:

   sourcetype=o365:management:activity

   If you do not see any events, check the Troubleshooting tab on your data collection node to verify that your accounts, forwarders, and inputs are all configured successfully.

Configure inputs in the configuration files

Configure your inputs using the configuration files on the Splunk platform instance responsible for collecting data for this add-on, usually a heavy forwarder.

1. Create $SPLUNK_HOME/etc/apps/Splunk_ta_o365/local/inputs.conf.

2. Add the following stanza.

[splunk_ta_o365_management_activity://<management_input_name>]
tenant_name = <value> 
interval = <value>
index = <value>
content_type = <value>
start_date_time = <value>

3. (Optional) If you want to change the data sources or polling intervals, edit the data parameter. These default values represent all the data sources currently available for collection with this add-on.

Note: CurrentStatus also includes HistoricalStatus. CurrentStatus uses the interval defined here, but HistoricalStatus uses 86400 (24 hours), because Microsoft generates historical status once per day. For more information, see https://msdn.microsoft.com/EN-US/library/office/dn707386.aspx.

4. (Optional) Configure a custom index.

5. Restart your Splunk platform instance.

6. Verify that data is successfully arriving by running the following search on your search head:

sourcetype=o365:management:activity

If you do not see any events, check the Troubleshooting tab on your data collection node to verify that your accounts, forwarders, and inputs are all configured successfully.

Input Parameters

Each attribute in the following table corresponds to a field in Splunk Web.

Input Name	Corresponding field in Splunk Web	Description
management_input_name	Input Name	A unique name for your input.
tenant_name	Tenant Name	The Microsoft Office 365 account from which you want to gather data.
content_type	Content type	The Microsoft Office 365 services from which you want to collect data through the API, with intervals for data collection for each service. The add-on automatically lists all services currently available. You can remove any or click the interval value to edit the frequency with which the add-on polls for new data from the API. Note: CurrentStatus also includes HistoricalStatus. CurrentStatus uses the interval defined here, but HistoricalStatus uses 86400 (24 hours), because Microsoft generates historical status once per day. For more information, see https://msdn.microsoft.com/EN-US/library/office/dn707386.aspx.
start_date_time	Start date/time	Select a Start date/time to specify how far back to go when initially collecting data. This parameter is optional. If no date/time is given, the input will start 4 hours in the past.
index	Index	The index in which the Microsoft Cloud Services data should be stored. The default is main.