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Azure DevOps Personal Access Token (PAT) misuse

Description

'This Alert detects whenever a PAT is used in ways that PATs are not normally used. May require an allow list and baselining. Reference - https://docs.microsoft.com/azure/devops/organizations/accounts/use-personal-access-tokens-to-authenticate?view=azure-devops&tabs=preview-page Use this query for baselining: ADOAuditLogs | distinct OperationName'
Rule type
Scheduled
Version
1.0.6
Declared status
Available
Query frequency
1h
Query period
1h
Trigger
gt 0

Declared MITRE coverage

KQL query

Original query, unchanged.

// Allowlisted UPNs should likely stay empty
let AllowlistedUpns = datatable(UPN:string)['foo@bar.com', 'test@foo.com'];
// Operation Name parts that will alert
let HasAnyBlocklist = datatable(OperationNamePart:string)['Security.','Project.','AuditLog.','Extension.'];
// Distinct Operation Names that will flag
let HasExactBlocklist = datatable(OperationName:string)['Group.UpdateGroupMembership.Add','Library.ServiceConnectionExecuted','Pipelines.PipelineModified',
'Release.ReleasePipelineModified', 'Git.RefUpdatePoliciesBypassed'];
ADOAuditLogs
| where AuthenticationMechanism startswith "PAT" and (OperationName has_any (HasAnyBlocklist) or OperationName in (HasExactBlocklist))
  and ActorUPN !in (AllowlistedUpns)
| project TimeGenerated, AuthenticationMechanism, ProjectName, ActorUPN, ActorDisplayName, IpAddress, UserAgent, OperationName, Details, Data
| extend timestamp = TimeGenerated
| extend AccountName = tostring(split(ActorUPN, "@")[0]), AccountUPNSuffix = tostring(split(ActorUPN, "@")[1])

Declared entities

AccountIP

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
ac891683-53c3-4f86-86b4-c361708e2b2b
Additional source files 3Solutions/AzureDevOpsAuditing/Analytic Rules/AzDOPatSessionMisuse.yamlsource ↗Detections/AzureDevOpsAuditing/AzDOPatSessionMisuse.yamlmigration-note ↗Solutions/AzureDevOpsAuditing/Data/Solution_AzureDevOpsAuditing.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.