Azure AD Audit Logs: User Added to Administrator Role

ATT&CK techniques

Initial Access → Defense Evasion

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
- T1078Valid Accounts
Execution
Persistence
- T1078Valid Accounts
- T1098.003Additional Cloud Roles
Priv Esc
- T1078Valid Accounts
- T1098.003Additional Cloud Roles
Defense Evasion
- T1078Valid Accounts
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule matches Azure AD audit log events where a user is added to a role with administrator-level scope by detecting the operation "Add member to role" and target role names containing "Admins" or "Administrator". Adding members to administrative roles grants elevated permissions and is a common persistence and privilege-escalation step for attackers. It relies on Azure audit log telemetry that includes operation name and target resource role names.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1078 — drag to rearrange

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Malicious Administrator Policy Attachment for Privilege Escalation in AWS

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Azure AD Audit Logs: User Added to Administrator Role

Pivot detection · T1078 · 9 related

Changelog

v5

v5
Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
v4
Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
v3
Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
v2
Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
v1
No changelog recorded for this version.2026-07-30

Detection content is published as a reviewed draft. Tune thresholds and exclusions against your own telemetry before enabling this rule for alerting.

azure-ad-audit-logs-user-added-to-administrator-role-ebbeb024

title: "Azure AD Audit Logs: User Added to Administrator Role"
id: 64f31563-13a0-439b-ab9c-f9878ffdb3c0
status: test
description: This rule matches Azure AD audit log events where a user is added to a role with administrator-level scope by detecting the operation "Add member to role" and target role names containing "Admins" or "Administrator". Adding members to administrative roles grants elevated permissions and is a common persistence and privilege-escalation step for attackers. It relies on Azure audit log telemetry that includes operation name and target resource role names.
references:
  - https://web.archive.org/web/20250904191633/https://m365internals.com/2021/07/13/what-ive-learned-from-doing-a-year-of-cloud-forensics-in-azure-ad/
  - https://research.splunk.com/cloud/a28f0bc3-3400-4a6e-a2da-89b9e95f0d2a/
  - https://analyticsrules.exchange/analyticrules/2a09f8cb-deb7-4c40-b08b-9137667f1c0b/
  - https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/entra/identity/monitoring-health/reference-audit-activities#core-directory
  - https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/master/rules/cloud/azure/audit_logs/azure_ad_user_added_to_admin_role.yml
author: Raphaël CALVET, @MetallicHack, Huntrule Team
date: 2021-10-04
modified: 2026-04-30
tags:
  - attack.initial-access
  - attack.persistence
  - attack.privilege-escalation
  - attack.stealth
  - attack.t1098.003
  - attack.t1078
logsource:
  product: azure
  service: auditlogs
detection:
  selection:
    operationName: Add member to role
    properties.targetResources|contains:
      - Admins
      - Administrator
  condition: selection
falsepositives:
  - PIM (Privileged Identity Management) generates this event each time 'eligible role' is enabled.
level: medium
license: DRL-1.1
related:
  - id: ebbeb024-5b1d-4e16-9c0c-917f86c708a7
    type: derived

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