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Event Service v1

About the Event Service

The Argus events API provides endpoints for searching and fetching events, as well as event statistics.

The Event API uses role based access control, so any search will be limited to the customers for which the user has permission to view events. In addition, fetching events by case provides access to the events associated with that case, provided that the user has read access to the case.

Tip

Please read the Overview to learn the general concepts and common data structures used throughout the Argus API.

Specific to the Event service is the Event model and its subtypes, raw and aggregated events.

Raw, formerly known as a NIDS (Network intrusion detection system) event, is the direct records of a security event. While aggregated is multiple events that has been merged together to form a more comprehensive model. Both types contains a set of standard fields, see below, and properties that helps describe both what happened and the environment that it happened in. These events can then be connected to ongoing cases for case handlers to deal with.

Event Model

customerInfo
Information on the customer for whom the event happen.
properties
A list of key-value pairs that details specific information related to the environment, processes the event has been through and appended information by the different agents.
The keys should be written in the format of "key.with.dot.separated.name", and the value can be Strings, Integers or IPs
comments
Comments added to the event either through automated systems or manually added by an analyst.
associatedCases
Argus cases that are related to the event.
location
Where the request causing the event took place, such as a datacenter, component or simply physical location.
attackInfo
Known information regarding the type of event such as the type of alarm that noticed it, what kind of attack and associated signature.
domain
The domain associated to the request, represented as by a FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) string.
uri
Related URI
count
Number of times the request causing the event has been seen.
source
The originator IP of the request, contains geo location, port and network address.
destination
The destination of the request, contains geo location, port and network address
protocol
The protocol used in the request causing the event.
timestamp
When the event occurred.
startTimestamp
Used for aggregates and represents the first occurrence of the event.
endTimestamp
Used for aggregates and represents the last occurence of the event.
lastUpdatedTimeStamp
When the information on the event was last updated.
flags
A list of states that helps define the event and what has been done during analysis.
severity
How critical the event is and from that how high it should be prioritized by analysts. Ranges from low to critical
detailedEventIDs
Related events, those that builds up the aggregate or simply associated with the event.
id
A unique identifier for the event. Contains the type, timestamp. An example would be AGGR/1569185283911/2171/6c36deb6-d5e3-461c-bab4-fca397006cb9

Fetch a single event

To fetch an event, append the event ID to the base URL 

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curl -H "Argus-API-Key: my/api/key" https://api.mnemonic.no/events/v1/AGGR/1569185283911/2171/6c36deb6-d5e3-461c-bab4-fca397006cb9
This returns the entire event:

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{
  "responseCode": 200,
  "limit": 0,
  "offset": 0,
  "count": 0,
  "metaData": {},
  "messages": [],
  "data": {
    "customerInfo": {
      "id": 2171,
      "shortName": "demo",
      "name": "Demo"
    },
    "properties": {
      "http_protocol": "HTTP/1.1",
      "event.original.signature": "SNORT-1:41336",
      "agent.parseTimestamp": "1569185281851",
      ...,
    },
    "associatedCase": null,
    "location": {
      "shortName": null,
      "name": null,
      "timeZone": "Europe/Oslo",
      "id": 0
    },
    "attackInfo": {
      "alarmID": 58129,
      "alarmDescription": "MALWARE - Andr.Trojan.Sysch variant activity",
      "attackCategoryID": 363,
      "attackCategoryName": "Callback traffic (Check-in) (infected client/server)",
      "signature": "SNORT-1:41336"
    },
    "domain": null,
    "uri": null,
    "count": 1,
    "source": {
      "port": 12342,
      "geoLocation": null,
      "networkAddress": {
        "host": true,
        "ipv6": false,
        "maskBits": 32,
        "multicast": false,
        "public": false,
        "address": "10.5.97.201"
      }
    },
    "destination": {
      "port": 80,
      "geoLocation": {
        "countryCode": "NO",
        "countryName": null,
        "locationName": "",
        "latitude": 52.3824,
        "longitude": 4.8995
      },
      "networkAddress": {
        "host": true,
        "ipv6": false,
        "maskBits": 32,
        "multicast": false,
        "public": true,
        "address": "94.127.56.1"
      }
    },
    "protocol": "0",
    "timestamp": 1569185283911,
    "startTimestamp": 1569185283910,
    "endTimestamp": 1569185283910,
    "lastUpdatedTimestamp": 1569186046339,
    "flags": [
      "BLOCKED",
      "CREATED_BY_ANALYSIS_FILTER",
      "FINALIZED",
      "CUSTOM_SOURCE_AGGREGATION",
      "CUSTOM_DESTINATION_AGGREGATION",
      "SOURCE_IS_CUSTOMERNET"
    ],
    "severity": "high",
    "detailedEventIDS": [],
    "id": "AGGR/1569185283911/2171/6c36deb6-d5e3-461c-bab4-fca397006cb9"
  },
  "size": 0
}

Searching for events

To search for events, query the aggregated endpoint to search among all security events.

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curl -H "Argus-API-Key: my/api/key" https://api.mnemonic.no/events/v1/aggregated
See the Swagger API documentation for details on available query parameters

To do more advanced filtering, use the advanced search endpoint.

The advanced search endpoint requires a startTimestamp.

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curl -H "Argus-API-Key: my/api/key" -XPOST https://api.mnemonic.no/events/v1/aggregated/search -d '{
  "signature": ["SNORT-1:41336"],"startTimestamp":1567288800000
}'
# or using a relative timestamp
curl -H "Argus-API-Key: my/api/key" -XPOST https://api.mnemonic.no/events/v1/aggregated/search -d '{
"signature": ["SNORT-1:41336"],"startTimestamp":"-2days"
}'

See the Swagger API documentation under events/events/v1/aggregated/search for example of usage, or go to Models/AggregatedEventSearchCriteria for details on available query parameters.

Searching by IP - CIDR ranges

Argus will by default resolve any CIDR IP range to match any IP contained within that range.

Moreover, Argus will also widen the search to include any covering ranges, i.e. any CIDR range with lower maskbits than specified which will contain the specified range/IP.

Example: Searching for 192.168.1.32/28

  • Will match CIDR range 192.168.1.32/28
  • Will match IP 192.168.1.33 (part of 192.168.1.32/28)
  • Will match CIDR range 192.168.1.40/29 (part of 192.168.1.32/28)
  • Will match CIDR range 192.168.1.0/24 (covers 192.168.1.32/28)
  • Will match CIDR range 0.0.0.0/0 (covers 192.168.1.32/28)

To control this behaviour, use parameters sourceIPMinBits anddestinationIPMinBits. Setting these parameters will limit how wide CIDR ranges will be considered:

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# Search for any event with source or destination IP within 192.168.1.0/24. 
# Do not match any CIDR networks wider than 192.168.0.0/20 (neither for source nor destination)
curl -H "Argus-API-Key: my/api/key" -XPOST https://api.mnemonic.no/events/v1/aggregated/search -d '{
  "ip": ["192.168.1.0/24"],
  "startTimestamp":"-2days",
  "sourceIPMinBits":20,  
  "destinationIPMinBits":20
}'

Any CIDR range specified in the search criteria will be searched for, even if the CIDR range has a lower maskbits than specified in these criteria.

Fetching events associated to a case

To fetch events associated with a case, use the eventsByCase endpoint:

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#list the first 10 events associated with case 12342345
curl -H "Argus-API-Key: my/api/key" https://api.mnemonic.no/events/v1/case/12342345?limit=10

Fetching large amounts of events

To pull out large amounts of events, it is important to select a strategy which is resource-efficient for both the server and client, as well as a robust strategy which will leave you with a complete dataset. There are several ways for doing this, all depending on your use case.

Common for all strategies

  • Use a medium-size limit to avoid fetching too big resultsets, but big enough to make transfer efficient
  • Use a clear sorting and limiting strategy to ensure that you will end up with a complete dataset

Pulling events continuously

This strategy fetches events in the order they are written in the event store. If an event is updated and written again, it will be returned again.

This strategy is well suited for fetching events continously and near real-time. 

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curl -H "Argus-API-Key: my/api/key" -X POST -H"Content-Type: application/json" https://api.mnemonic.no/events/v1/aggregated/search -d '{
  "startTimestamp": "2020-01-01T00:00:00Z", //need to set a lower bound for the search
  "limit":1000,
  "sortBy":"lastUpdatedTimestamp"
}'

This will fetch the first 1000 events sorted by eventlastUpdatedTimestamp. The response:

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{
  "responseCode": 200,
  ...,
  "data": [
    ...,
    {
      ...,
      "lastUpdatedTimestamp": 1581721863924,
      ... 
    }
  ]
}

Subsequent requests should use the lastUpdatedTimestamp value of the last event in the previous result, to fetch the next 1000 events:

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curl -H "Argus-API-Key: my/api/key" -X POST -H"Content-Type: application/json" https://api.mnemonic.no/events/v1/aggregated/search -d '{
  "startTimestamp": "2020-01-01T00:00:00Z", //need to set a lower bound for the search
  "lastUpdatedTimestamp": 1581721863924
  "limit":1000,
  "sortBy":"lastUpdatedTimestamp"
}'