Identity Alert Triage

1. Prerequisites

• Identity provider alerts
• Authentication telemetry
• MFA telemetry
• User reports
• VPN telemetry
• Session activity logs

Required Tools:

• Identity provider
• SIEM
• MFA platform
• VPN telemetry
• Threat intelligence platform

2. Step-by-Step Instructions

Common Failure Modes

• Treating impossible travel as definitive compromise
• Ignoring successful MFA activity
• Missing shared infrastructure indicators

1. Validate Alert Authenticity

   • Determine:

     • Alert source
     • Detection type
     • Alert confidence
     • Triggering conditions

   • Review:

     • Alert metadata
     • Authentication anomalies
     • Associated indicators

2. Identify Impacted Identity

   • Collect:
     • Username
     • Email address
     • Privilege level
     • Group memberships
     • Administrative roles
     • Device associations

3. Review Authentication Activity

   • Review:
     • Login timestamps
     • Source IPs
     • Geolocation
     • Device fingerprints
     • MFA outcomes

4. Assess Active Risk

   • Determine:
     • Is attacker activity ongoing?
     • Are active sessions present?
     • Is privilege escalation suspected?
     • Is lateral movement suspected?

5. Assess Scope

   • Identify:
     • Additional impacted accounts
     • Shared devices
     • Shared IPs
     • Similar authentication patterns

3. Post-Action

• Ensure all alert validation findings and containment recommendations are documented in the incident ticket

Contributor

Vishal Thakur GitHub: https://github.com/malienist

Jayden Vo GitHub: https://github.com/jayden-vo

Contributed to the Arcana Incident Response Documentation Framework.