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Upgrade to ProDetect Data Exfiltration via Anonymous SharePoint/OneDrive Sharing Links in Elastic Security
Rather than uploading data to an external cloud storage account (T1537) or a third-party tool like rclone or Mega, an adversary — or a malicious/negligent insider — can exfiltrate data using Microsoft 365's own file-sharing feature: generating an 'Anyone' (anonymous) or externally-shared link for a SharePoint or OneDrive file or folder, then downloading it from an unmanaged device or forwarding the link outside the organization. Because the traffic never leaves Microsoft's infrastructure and no suspicious process or unusual outbound network connection is generated, this technique evades every process- and network-telemetry-based exfiltration detection (EDR process monitoring, DeviceNetworkEvents, proxy logs). Detection instead depends entirely on the Microsoft 365 Unified Audit Log (Office 365 Management Activity API), which records SharePoint/OneDrive sharing operations such as AnonymousLinkCreated, SharingInvitationCreated, AddedToSecureLink, and the corresponding *LinkUsed events when the link is subsequently accessed.
MITRE ATT&CK
- Tactic
- Exfiltration
Elastic Detection Query
any where event.dataset == "o365.audit" and o365.audit.Workload == "SharePoint" and (
o365.audit.Operation == "AnonymousLinkCreated" or
o365.audit.Operation == "SharingInvitationCreated" or
o365.audit.Operation == "AddedToSecureLink" or
o365.audit.Operation == "AnonymousLinkUsed"
)Detects Microsoft 365 SharePoint/OneDrive anonymous and external sharing link events ingested via the Elastic Office 365 integration (Filebeat/Elastic Agent o365 module), which maps Unified Audit Log records into the o365.audit.* ECS fields. Matches link-creation and link-usage operations for downstream aggregation by user and time window to surface bulk-sharing or sensitive-file-sharing patterns.
Data Sources
Required Tables
False Positives & Tuning
- Sales, legal, and partnership teams sharing external-facing documents as part of normal business workflow
- Automated Power Automate/SharePoint workflows generating links for approved processes
Other platforms for THREAT-Exfiltration-M365AnonymousShareLinks
Testing Methodology
Validate this detection against 2 adversary techniques from Atomic Red Team. Each test below lists the behaviour to exercise and the telemetry you should expect to see. Executable commands and cleanup steps are available with Pro.
- Test 1Create Anonymous Sharing Link via PnP PowerShell
Expected signal: Office 365 Unified Audit Log: Operation=AnonymousLinkCreated, Workload=SharePoint, RecordType=SharePointSharingOperation, with the UserId and ObjectId of the test file.
- Test 2Bulk Anonymous Link Creation Simulation
Expected signal: 12 AnonymousLinkCreated audit events for the same UserId within a short time window.
References (4)
- https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1567/002/
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/detailed-properties-in-the-office-365-audit-log
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/turn-external-sharing-on-or-off
- https://github.com/redcanaryco/atomic-red-team/blob/master/atomics/T1567.002/T1567.002.md
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Related Detections
Tactic Hub
Detection Variants (1)
Different telemetry and tradecraft for the same technique — pick the one that matches the data you collect.