Next-Generation Firewall
Syslog Filters
Table of Contents
Syslog Filters
The User-ID agent uses Syslog Parse profiles to filter syslog messages
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sent from the syslog
senders that the agent monitors for IP address-to-username mapping
information (see Configure
Access to Monitored Servers). Each profile can parse syslog
messages for either of the following event types, but not both:
- Authentication (login) events—Used to add user mappings to the firewall.
- Logout events—Used to delete user mappings that are no longer current. Deleting outdated mappings is useful in environments where IP address assignments change often.
Palo Alto Networks provides the firewall with predefined Syslog
Parse profiles through Applications content updates. To dynamically
update the list of profiles as vendors develop new filters, schedule
these dynamic content updates (see Device
> Dynamic Updates). The predefined profiles are global to
the firewall, whereas the custom profiles you configure apply only
to the virtual system (Location) selected
under .
Syslog messages must meet the following criteria for a User-ID
agent to parse them:
- Each message must be a single-line text string. A new line (\n) or a carriage return plus a new line (\r\n) are the delimiters for line breaks.
- The maximum size for individual messages is 8,000 bytes.
- Messages sent over UDP must be contained in a single packet; messages sent over SSL can span multiple packets. A single packet might contain multiple messages.
To configure a custom profile, click Add and
specify the settings described in the following table. The field
descriptions in this table use a login event example from a syslog
message with the following format:
[Tue Jul 5 13:15:04 2005 CDT] Administrator authentication success User:domain\johndoe_4 Source:192.168.0.212
The complete procedure
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to configure the
User-ID agent to parse a syslog sender for user mapping information
requires additional tasks besides creating a Syslog Parse profile.
Field | Description |
|---|---|
Syslog Parse Profile | Enter a name for the profile (up to 63 alphanumeric characters). |
Description | Enter a description for the profile (up
to 255 alphanumeric characters). |
Type | Specify the type of parsing for filtering
the user mapping information:
The
remaining fields in the dialog vary based on your selection. Configure
the fields as described in the following rows. |
Event Regex | Enter the regex for identifying successful
authentication or logout events. For the example message used with
this table, the regex (authentication\ success) {1} extracts
the first {1} instance of the string authentication success.
The backslash before the space is a standard regex escape character
that instructs the regex engine not to treat the space as a special
character. |
Username Regex | Enter the regex for identifying the username
field in authentication success or logout messages. For the example message
used with this table, the regex User:([a-zA-Z0-9\\\._]+) would match
the string User:johndoe_4 and extract acme\johndoe1
as the username. |
Address Regex | Enter the regex to identify the IP address
portion of authentication success or logout messages. In the example message
used with this table, the regular expression Source:([0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}) matches
the IPv4 address Source:192.168.0.212 and adds
192.168.0.212 as the IP address in the username mapping. |
Event String | Enter a matching string to identify authentication
success or logout messages. For the example message used with this table,
you would enter the string authentication success. |
Username Prefix | Enter the matching string to identify the
beginning of the username field within authentication or logout
syslog messages. The field does not support regex expressions such
as \s (for a space) or \t (for
a tab). In the example message used with this table, User: identifies
the start of the username field. |
Username Delimiter | Enter the delimiter that marks the end of
the username field within an authentication or logout message. Use
\s to indicate a standalone space (as in the example message) and
\t to indicate a tab. |
Address Prefix | Enter a matching string to identify the
start of the IP address field in syslog messages. The field does
not support regex expressions such as \s (for
a space) or \t (for a tab). In the example message
used with this table, Source: identifies
the start of the address field. |
Address Delimiter | Enter the matching string that marks the
end of the IP address field within authentication success or logout
messages. For example, enter \n to indicate
the delimiter is a line break. |
Addresses Per Log | Enter the maximum number of IP addresses
that you want the firewall to parse (default is 1; range is 1—3). |