As part of preparing for the SC-300 Microsoft Identity and Access Administrator exam, it’s crucial to understand how to analyze Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) using workbooks and reporting in the Azure AD console. This examination also measures the candidates’ ability to complete several technical tasks, such as designing, implementing an identity management solution, and more. In this regard, analyzing Azure AD through workbooks and reporting serves as a critical feature.
Azure AD is Microsoft’s cloud-based identity and access management service, which helps employees sign in and access resources. Azure AD carries rich capabilities for monitoring and reporting. These capabilities allow you to gain insights into the identity infrastructure used by your organization and understand how it is being utilized.
Analyzing Azure AD by using Workbooks
Workbooks combine Azure AD’s logs and data to produce comprehensive reports using interactive visualizations. They offer in-depth, customizable views across your recorded data, which you can use to gain actionable insights.
Workbooks come with various templates that provide quick insights related to a particular category, including sign-in logs, audit logs, or risk information. Additionally, you can produce your workbooks using the rich selection of controls and data connectors available.
Here are steps on using workbooks to analyze Azure AD:
- Navigate to the Azure portal and open Azure AD.
- Go to Monitoring > Workbooks.
- You see a variety of pre-configured workbooks. Select one based on your requirements.
- The workbook displays data based on the stored logs. You can adjust the parameters set in the workbook to get more specific reports.
- Workbooks are also interactive, allowing you to filter, sort, or drill down into specific details.
Reporting in Azure Active Directory
Azure AD provides robust reporting that tracks user activity, sign-in activity, user addition and deletion, password changes, and more. These activities are intended to help you identify inconsistencies, troubleshoot problems, and provide better insights into your data.
Here are steps on how to leverage reporting in Azure AD:
- Sign in to the Azure portal.
- Navigate to Azure Active Directory > Monitoring > Report.
- From here, you can choose from different types of reports, such as Audit logs, Sign-ins, Password reset activity, and more.
- By selecting one of the available reports, you can check the data presented in the form of a graphical chart, which can be further sorted, filtered, and examined for specified details.
To give you a sense of what these two reporting types can provide, let’s look at a comparison:
| Feature | Azure AD Workbook | Azure AD Reports |
|---|---|---|
| Data type | Interactive data visualizations | Raw log data |
| Customizability | High (custom workbooks) | Medium (filtering, sorting on UI) |
| Designed for | Analyzing patterns, trends | Detailed analysis on specific logs |
| Pre-configured queues | Yes | Yes |
In conclusion, analyzing Azure AD using workbooks and reporting not only helps in drawing insightful conclusions about your organization’s identity infrastructure but also in preparing for the SC-300 Microsoft Identity and Access Administrator exam. Understanding these features allows you to effectively administer, monitor, and streamline your organization’s Azure AD usage, making you an efficient Identity and Access administrator.
Practice Test
True or False: Azure Activity logs are part of Azure AD workbook logs.
- True
- False
Answer: False
Explanation: The Azure Activity logs are not part of the Azure AD workbook logs but they are part of Azure monitor logs.
What are the Azure AD workbooks?
- A. Pre-configured reports
- B. User dashboards
- C. Interactive data analytics tools
- D. Only data extraction tools
Answer: C. Interactive data analytics tools
Explanation: Azure AD workbooks provide interactive data analytics tools in the Azure portal. It’s not just pre-configured reports or user dashboards.
True or False: Azure AD uses workbooks to interpret, interact, and analyze data.
- True
- False
Answer: True
Explanation: Azure AD uses workbooks for insights and data interpretation, offering an interactive means to analyze and work with data.
Are you able to share Azure AD workbooks with other users or groups?
- A. Yes, without any limitations
- B. Yes, but with limitations
- C. No
Answer: B. Yes, but with limitations
Explanation: Azure AD workbooks can be shared with other users and groups, but they must have the necessary permissions to see the data associated with the workbook.
Can you use Azure AD workbooks to track sign-ins and risky sign-ins?
- A. Yes
- B. No
Answer: A. Yes
Explanation: With Azure AD workbooks, you can monitor activities like sign-ins, risky sign-ins and can also track other relevant data.
True or False: Azure AD workbook reports can be exported in CSV format only.
- True
- False
Answer: False
Explanation: Azure AD workbook reports can be exported in various formats like CSV, Excel, and others.
Can Azure AD use workbooks for real-time monitoring?
- A. Yes
- B. No
Answer: A. Yes
Explanation: Azure AD uses workbooks for real-time and historical data monitoring and analysis.
What information can you see in the Azure AD sign-ins report in the report workbook?
- A. Date and time of sign-in attempts
- B. Risky sign-ins
- C. The location from which sign-ins originate
- D. All of the above
Answer: D. All of the above
Explanation: Azure AD Sign-in reports provide detailed information, including date/time of sign-ins, risky sign-ins, and the location of the sign-in attempt.
True or False: You cannot customize Azure AD workbooks to create specific reporting views.
- True
- False
Answer: False
Explanation: Azure AD workbooks are highly customizable allowing administrators to create specific reporting views based on their unique requirements.
True or False: The Azure AD console gives a consolidated view of all reports and workbooks.
- True
- False
Answer: True
Explanation: The Azure AD console provides a consolidated view of all the reports and workbooks, making data interpretation easy.
Are Azure AD Identity Protection risk detections available in the Azure AD reporting?
- A. Yes
- B. No
Answer: A. Yes
Explanation: Azure AD Identity Protection risk detections are part of Azure AD reporting, providing valuable insights into potential security threats.
True or False: You must program your Azure AD workbook to review risky users and risky sign-ins.
- True
- False
Answer: False
Explanation: You don’t need to program your workbook. Azure AD already provides built-in reports for reviewing risky users and risky sign-ins.
Which Azure AD tier allows access to workbook and reporting tools?
- A. Free
- B. Office 365 Apps
- C. Premium P1
- D. Premium P2
Answer: D. Premium P2
Explanation: To access the full suite of workbook and reporting tools in Azure AD, you need Premium P2 subscription.
True or False: Azure AD workbooks can provide insights on privileged identity management.
- True
- False
Answer: True
Explanation: Azure AD workbooks include reports that highlight the use of privileged identities, helping to identify potential security concerns.
In Azure AD console, which feature can you use to visualize and analyze Azure Active Directory data?
- A. Workbook
- B. Tiles
- C. Both
- D. None of the above
Answer: A. Workbook
Explanation: Azure AD provides workbooks for visualizing and analyzing Azure Active Directory data. Tiles are part of the dashboard layout but do not offer deep dive data analysis.
Interview Questions
What is Azure AD Workbooks?
Azure AD Workbooks are a collection of visual reports across a dataset, providing the ability to explore and analyze data in Azure AD environment. They provide insights into your identity infrastructure like Sign-ins, Audit logs, Risky users, Usage, and more.
How do you access Azure AD Reporting?
Accessing Azure AD Reporting can be done by navigating to the “Azure Active Directory” section of the Azure Portal. Therefrom, you would find the “Monitoring + Management” section in which you’d click on “Azure AD reports”.
What data source is the Azure AD Workbook “Sign-in logs” based on?
The “Sign-in logs” Workbook is based on Azure Monitor, which allows users to review Azure AD sign-in data.
What can you find in the Azure AD Audit Logs?
Azure AD Audit Logs provide traceability through logs for changes done in your Azure AD. They can provide details on changes like updates in role assignments, application management, group management, password resets and more.
Is it possible to export Azure AD Reports and Workbooks?
Yes, you can export Azure AD Reports and Workbooks to a PDF or Excel file, and they can also be shared with others in your organization.
Can you customize Azure AD Workbooks?
Yes. Azure AD Workbooks are customizable. You can create your own workbook, customize the existing ones, and pin them to your Azure dashboard for quick access.
What insights can you get from the User Risk Workbook in Azure AD?
The User Risk Workbook provides insights into your user risk profile and helps you to understand risky user behavior within your organization.
Where do you find the sign-in activity report in Azure AD?
You can find the sign-in activity report by going to Azure Portal → Azure Active Directory → Monitoring & Management → Reporting → Sign-ins.
What data does the Azure AD Risky Users Workbook provide?
The Azure AD Risky Users Workbook provides data such as the type of risky users, what risks they triggered, the risk detection date, risk level, and risk detail.
How often are Azure AD reports updated?
Azure AD reports are updated every 24 hours.
Which Azure AD feature would you use to get insights on how the applications in your organization are performing?
To get the insights on how the applications in your organization are performing, you would use the ‘Application usage’ workbook in Azure AD.
Can a user access Azure AD reporting without administrator privileges?
No, a user must have the required administrator role assigned to view Azure AD reports and workbooks.
Can you set up automatic email alerts for Azure AD Reports?
Yes, using Azure Monitor you can set up automatic email alerts for critical activities captured in Azure AD Reports.
What is user risk profile in Azure AD?
A user risk profile in Azure AD defines the probability that a given identity or account is compromised. These are calculated using machine learning algorithms and heuristics.
What types of insights does the ‘Activity logs’ workbook in Azure AD provide?
‘Activity logs’ workbook provides insights such as update events, delete events and their corresponding user details helping the administrators to understand the pattern of user activity.
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