↳ GitHub sourceAnalytics ruleMedium

Rare client observed with high reverse DNS lookup count

Description

'Identifies clients with a high reverse DNS counts that could be carrying out reconnaissance or discovery activity. Alerts are generated if the IP performing such reverse DNS lookups was not seen doing so in the preceding 7-day period.'
Rule type
Scheduled
Version
1.0.2
Declared status
Available
Query frequency
1d
Query period
8d
Trigger
gt 0

Declared MITRE coverage

Declared sources

Metadata from the source file. No dependencies inferred from KQL.

Connectors

Data types

KQL query

Original query, unchanged.

let starttime = 8d;
let endtime = 1d;
let threshold = 10;
DnsEvents
| where TimeGenerated > ago(endtime)
| where Name has "in-addr.arpa"
| summarize StartTimeUtc = min(TimeGenerated), EndTimeUtc = max(TimeGenerated), dcount(Name), ReverseDNSLookup_List = make_set(Name,100) by ClientIP
| where dcount_Name > threshold
| project StartTimeUtc, EndTimeUtc, ClientIP , dcount_Name, ReverseDNSLookup_List
// Filter out previously seen IPs
// Returns all the records from the left side that don't have matches from the right
| join kind=leftanti (DnsEvents
    | where TimeGenerated between(ago(starttime)..ago(endtime))
    | where Name has "in-addr.arpa"
    | summarize dcount(Name) by ClientIP, bin(TimeGenerated, 1d)
    | where dcount_Name > threshold
    | project ClientIP , dcount_Name
) on ClientIP

Declared entities

IP

Related content

Links established from declared identifiers and solution manifests.

Source provenance

GitHub

Displayed values come from files in Azure/Azure-Sentinel. They describe the published template, not your workspace configuration.

Source identifier
15ae38a2-2e29-48f7-883f-863fb25a5a06
Additional source files 3Solutions/Windows Server DNS/Analytic Rules/DNS_HighReverseDNSCount_detection.yamlsource ↗Detections/DnsEvents/DNS_HighReverseDNSCount_detection.yamlmigration-note ↗Solutions/Windows Server DNS/Data/Solution_DNS.jsonsolution-membership ↗
GSTEP / CATALOG TRACKING

Added to catalog : 16 Sept 2026 · 05:49 UTC
Last change observed : 16 Sept 2026 · 05:49 UTC

GSTEP sync dates, separate from the source content’s publication dates.