Chat now with support
Chat with Support

Change Auditor 7.3 - User Guide

Change Auditor Overview Agent Deployment Change Auditor Client Overview Overview Page Searches Search Results and Event Details Custom Searches and Search Properties Enable Alert Notifications Administration Tasks Agent Configurations Coordinator Configuration Purging and Archiving your Change Auditor Database Disable Private Alerts and Reports Generate and Schedule Reports SQL Reporting Services Configuration Change Auditor User Interface Authorization Client Authentication Certificate authentication for client coordinator communication Integrating with On Demand Audit Enable/Disable Event Auditing Account Exclusion Registry Auditing Service Auditing Agent Statistics and Logs Coordinator Statistics and Logs Change Auditor Commands Change Auditor Email Tags

Registry Auditing

•
Introduction
•
Registry Auditing page
•
Registry Auditing templates
•
Registry Auditing wizard

Introduction

The ability to audit registry settings improves operational efficiency dramatically. For example, some applications, such as virus scanning software, modify registry keys when an update is installed. By capturing these change events proactively, administrators can determine whether or not specific machines received an update.

Furthermore, other applications may warrant the tracking of modifications to certain registry settings to ensure that they have not been tampered with. Change Auditor’s registry auditing feature allows you to audit changes to a specific key or to a folder and its sub folders.

To capture registry events, you must define the registry keys to be audited and the events to be captured:

1
Create a Registry Auditing template which specifies the registry keys and events to be audited. For more information on creating a Registry Auditing template, refer to Registry Auditing templates.
2
Add this template to an agent configuration. For more information on adding a Registry Auditing template to an agent configuration, refer to Define agent configurations.
3
Assign the agent configuration to agents. For more information on assigning an agent configuration to an agent, refer to Assign agent configurations to server agents.
* 
NOTE: Event logging is disabled by default; and when enabled, only configured activities will be captured in the Windows event log.

Registry Auditing page

The Registry Auditing page is displayed when Registry is selected from the Auditing task list in the navigation pane of the Administration Tasks page. From this page you can launch the Registry Auditing wizard to specify a registry key to be audited. You can also edit existing templates, disable/enable templates and remove templates that are no longer being used.

The Registry Auditing page contains an expandable view of all the Registry Auditing templates that have been previously defined. To add a new template to the list, use the Add tool bar button. Once added, the following information is provided for the template:

Template
Displays the name assigned to the template when it was created.
Status
Indicates whether the template is enabled or disabled. To enable/disable the template, place your cursor in this Status cell, click the arrow control and select the appropriate option from the drop-down menu.
Registry Keys
This field is used for filtering data.

Click the expansion box to the left of the Template name to expand this view and display additional details about an auditing template.

Registry Key
Displays the name of the file path for the registry key in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE hive which was selected for auditing on the Key page of the wizard.
Status
Indicates whether auditing of the registry key is enabled or disabled. To enable/disable the auditing of the registry key, place your cursor in this Status cell, click the arrow control and select the appropriate option from the drop-down menu.
Scope
Displays the scope selected for this template on the Key page of the wizard:
•
This object only
•
This object and child objects only
•
This object and all child objects
Value
If applicable, this column displays the specific value selected for auditing (only applies to This object and child objects only scope).
Operations
Displays the events selected for auditing on the Events page of the wizard. Hover your mouse over this cell to view all of the events included in the template.
Exclude
Displays the names of the sub keys to be excluded from auditing as specified on the Exclusions tab of the wizard.

Registry Auditing templates

* 
NOTE: The cells directly under the main heading rows are used for filtering data. That is, as you enter characters into these cells, the client will redisplay the templates that meet the search criteria (i.e., comparison operator and characters entered). For more details about using the data filtering function provided throughout the Change Auditor client, see Filter data.

To enable custom registry auditing you must create a Registry Auditing template which specifies the registry keys and events to audit. You can then assign this template to an agent configuration, which then needs to be assigned to the appropriate agents.

To create a Registry Auditing template:
1
Open the Administration Tasks tab and click Auditing.
2
Select Registry (under the Server heading in the Auditing task list) to open the Registry Auditing page.
3
Click Add to start the Registry Auditing wizard which will step you through the process of creating a Registry Auditing template.
4
Enter a name for the template.
5
Enter or use one of the Browse options to locate and select the registry key in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE hive to be audited.
•
Selecting the Browse | Local Registry option displays the Select registry key dialog allowing you to select a registry key from the local server.
•
Selecting the Browse | Remote Registry option displays the Select Active Directory Object dialog allowing you to select the server whose registry you would like to browse. Use the Browse or Search pages to locate and select the server. On the Select registry key dialog select the registry key to be audited.
Once you have selected the registry key to be audited, click Add to add it to the selection list.
Repeat this step to add additional registry keys to the template.
6
For each registry key listed, select the key in the list and perform steps 8 - 11 to specify the scope, events, values and optionally any sub keys that are to be excluded.
7
In the Scope cell, use the drop-down menu to select the scope of coverage:
•
This object only
•
This object and child objects only
•
This object and all child objects (default)
8
On the Events tab select the key and value events that are to be included in the audit.
* 
NOTE: Selecting the Key Events or Value Events check box at the top of the events list on the Events tab will select all of the events listed under the heading. Similarly, clearing the check boxes will clear all of the selected events.
9
If you selected the This object and child objects only option in the Scope cell, you can also specify a specific value for the selected key. To audit a specific value, open the Value tab and enter the value in the text box provided.
10
(Optional) On the Exclusions tab, add the names of any sub keys to be excluded from auditing. Use one of the Browse options to locate and select a sub key under the selected registry key to be excluded from auditing:
•
Selecting Browse | Local Registry displays the Select registry key dialog allowing you to select a sub key from the local server.
•
Selecting Browse | Remote Registry displays the Select Active Directory Object dialog allowing you to select the server whose registry you would like to browse. Use the browse or search pages to locate and select the server. From the Select registry key dialog, select the sub key to be excluded.
* 
NOTE: If you select a sub key that does not belong to the selected registry key, the wizard will not allow you to continue. A red flashing icon is displayed indicating that you have selected a sub key outside of the selected registry key.
You can also enter the name of the sub key to be excluded or use a file mask to select a group of sub keys. A file mask can contain any combination of the following:
•
Fixed characters such as letters, numbers and other characters allowed in sub key names.
•
Asterisk (*) wildcard character to substitute zero or more characters.
•
Question mark (?) wildcard character to substitute a single character.
Once you have specified a sub key for exclusion, click Add to add it to the Exclusions list at the bottom of the page.
Repeat this step to add additional sub keys to the Exclusions list.
11
To create the template without assigning it to an agent configuration, click Finish.
Clicking Finish creates the template, closes the wizard and returns to the Registry Auditing page, where the newly created template will now be listed.
12
To create the template and assign it to an agent configuration, expand Finish and click Finish and Assign to Agent Configuration.
This will display the Configuration Setup dialog allowing you to select the agent configuration to which this template is to be assigned.
* 
NOTE: On the Auditing page, you can also use the Assign tool bar button to assign the selected template to an agent configuration. Clicking this button will display the Configuration Setup dialog allowing you to select the agent configuration to which this template is to be assigned.
13
On the Agent Configuration page, select the agents assigned to use the modified agent configuration and click Refresh Configuration to ensure the agents use the latest configuration.
To modify a Registry Auditing template:
* 
NOTE: If you do not refresh the agent’s configuration, the agent will automatically check for a new agent configuration based on the polling interval setting (located on the System Settings tab of the Configuration Setup dialog). The default is every 15 minutes.
1
On the Registry Auditing page, select the registry key whose properties are to be modified, and click Edit.
2
This displays the Registry Auditing wizard, where you can modify the following properties:
•
Registry key
•
Scope
•
Events (Events tab)
•
Value (Value tab)
•
Excluded sub keys (Exclusions tab)
3
Once you have made your modifications, click Finish or expand Finish and click Finish and Assign to Agent Configuration.
To disable a Registry Auditing template:

Disabling allows you to temporarily stop auditing the specified registry key without having to remove the auditing template or individual registry key from an active template.

1
On the Auditing page, place your cursor in the Status cell for the template to be disabled, click the arrow control and select Disabled.
The entry in the Status column for the template will change to ‘Disabled’.
2
To re-enable the auditing template, use the Enable option in either the Status cell or right-click menu.
To disable the auditing of a registry key in an auditing template:
1
On the Registry Auditing page, place your cursor in the Status cell for the registry key to be disabled, click the arrow control and select Disabled from the drop-down menu
The entry in the Status column for the registry key will change to ‘Disabled’.
2
To re-enable the auditing of a registry key, use the Enable option in either the Status cell or right-click menu.
To delete a Registry Auditing template:
1
On the Auditing page, select the template to delete and click Delete | Delete Template.
2
A dialog will be displayed confirming that you want to delete the selected template. Click Yes.
To delete a registry key from an auditing template:
1
On the Registry Auditing page, select the registry key to delete and click Delete | Delete Registry Key
2
A dialog will be displayed confirming that you want to delete the registry key from the template. Click Yes.
* 
NOTE: If the registry key is the last one in the template, deleting this registry key will also delete the template.
Related Documents

The document was helpful.

Select Rating

I easily found the information I needed.

Select Rating