🛡️OWASP 9 : Security Logging and Monitoring Failures

Attackers love blind spots. And one of the biggest blind spots in cybersecurity is the lack of proper logging and monitoring. OWASP categorizes this risk as Security Logging and Monitoring Failures (A09), emphasizing how the absence of visibility allows attackers to exploit systems undetected, sometimes for months or even years.

This blog post explores what these failures are, their types, real-world examples, and actionable recommendations to reduce the risk.

What are Security Logging and Monitoring Failures?

A Security Logging and Monitoring Failure occurs when an application or system doesn’t generate, monitor, or respond to sufficient logs and alerts about suspicious activities. Without proper logging and monitoring, organizations cannot detect, investigate, or recover from security incidents effectively.

In other words: if you don’t see it, you can’t stop it.

Types of Logging & Monitoring Failures

1. Missing Logs

   • Critical events (authentication, privilege escalation, file access) are not logged at all.

2. Incomplete or Weak Logs

   • Logs don’t capture enough detail (e.g., no IP, timestamp, or user ID).

3. Unmonitored Logs

   • Logs are collected but never analyzed or correlated with threat intelligence.

4. Poor Alerting Mechanisms

   • Alerts are either missing, delayed, or overly noisy, leading to alert fatigue.

5. Insecure Log Storage

   • Logs stored in plain text or with weak access control can be tampered with.

6. Lack of Incident Response Integration

   • Even when anomalies are logged, there’s no proper process to respond quickly.

Real-World Examples

• Target Data Breach (2013):Attackers stole payment card data from millions of customers. Target’s security systems did generate alerts, but they were ignored due to poor monitoring processes.

• Equifax Breach (2017):Poor logging delayed the detection of the massive breach for weeks, giving attackers more time to exploit sensitive data.

• Capital One Breach (2019):Misconfigured logging in AWS environments made it harder to detect the scale of the insider-style attack.

Recommendations to Prevent Logging & Monitoring Failures

1. Enable Comprehensive Logging

   • Log critical events: logins, failed logins, privilege changes, sensitive data access, system errors, and API calls.

2. Standardize Logs

   • Use consistent formats (e.g., JSON, Syslog) for easier parsing and correlation.

3. Centralized Log Management

   • Aggregate logs into a SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) system like Splunk, ELK Stack, or Azure Sentinel.

4. Enable Real-Time Monitoring

   • Monitor logs with automated anomaly detection, alerting, and dashboards.

5. Protect Logs from Tampering

   • Use encryption and access control. Implement write-once storage or immutability features.

6. Regular Testing & Tuning

   • Simulate attacks (red team/blue team exercises) to ensure logs capture the right data and alerts work as expected.

7. Integrate with Incident Response

   • Link monitoring tools with playbooks to ensure quick action (isolate users, block IPs, revoke tokens).

Final Thoughts

Security Logging and Monitoring Failures are often underestimated because they don’t directly cause breaches—but they enable attackers to hide. By the time most breaches are discovered, attackers have already done irreparable damage.

The lesson is simple: don’t just collect logs—monitor them, protect them, and act on them.