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Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN

Overview

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is a cloud-managed solution that delivers secure, high-performance SD-WAN connectivity across campuses, branches and multi-cloud environments.

  • Vendor: Cisco
  • Supported environment: On Premise
  • Version compatibility: 17.4.1 and above
  • Detection based on: Telemetry
  • Supported application or feature: Network traffic monitoring

Warning

Important note - This format is currently in beta. We highly value your feedback to improve its performance.

Specification

Prerequisites

  • Resource:
    • Sekoia.io netflow forwarder
  • Network:
    • Outbound traffic allowed
  • Permissions:
    • Administrator or Root access to the Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN device
    • Root access to the Linux server with the netflow forwarder

Transport Protocol/Method

  • Indirect Netflow

Logs details

  • Supported functionalities: See section Overview
  • Supported type(s) of structure: IPFIX
  • Supported verbosity level: Informational

Step-by-Step Configuration Procedure

Instructions on the 3rd Party Solution

Forward Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN netflows

This setup guide will show you how to provide an integration between Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN traffic monitoring and Sekoia.io.

Create the Centralized policy:

  • Log on your Catalyst SD‑WAN Manager
  • Go to Configuration > Policies
  • Select Centralized Policy
  • Click Add Policy
  • At the Create Group of Interest step, click items on the left panel to create your group of interest.
  • For example:
    • To add a list of VPNs:
      • On the left panel, go to VPN
      • Click New VPN List
      • Type a VPN List Name
      • Type the VPNs to add in Add VPN
    • To add a list of sites:
      • On the left panel, go to Site
      • Click New Site List
      • Type a Site List Name
      • Type the sites to add in Add Site
  • When done, click Next
  • At the Configure Topology and VPN Membership step, add topology and VPN Membership as you wish
  • Click Next
  • At the Configure Traffic Rules, go to Cflowd
  • Click Add Policy > Create New
  • Type a name and a description for the Policy
  • In the Cflowd Template section, set the properties at your convenience
  • Go to the Collector List section
  • Click New Collector
  • Type the VPN ID
  • Type the address of the netflow collector as IP address
  • Type the listen port of the netflow collector as Port
  • Select UDP as Transport Protocol
  • Type the name of the interface to use to send flows to the collector as Source interface
  • Click Add
  • Click Next
  • At Apply Policies to Sites and VPNs, type a Policy Name and a Policy Description
  • Click the CFlowd tab
  • Select sites to add in the Site List
  • Click Save Policy
  • In the Centralized Policy view, click ... at the right of your policy
  • Click Activate menu
  • In the confirmation box, Click Activate

See documentation

Create the Localized policy:

  • Log on your Catalyst SD‑WAN Manager
  • Go to Configuration > Policies
  • Select Localized Policy
  • Click Add Policy
  • Click Next until reaching the Policy Overview
  • Type a Policy Name
  • Type a Policy Description
  • Check Netflow for IPv4 traffic
  • Check Netflow IPv6 for IPv6 traffic
  • Click Save Policy

See documentation

Apply the localized policy:

  • Go to Configuration > Templates
  • Click Device Templates
  • Select a template and click ... at the right of the template
  • Click Edit menu
  • Go to Additional Templates
  • Select the localized policy as Policy
  • Click Save

Instruction on Sekoia

Configure Your Intake

This section will guide you through creating the intake object in Sekoia, which provides a unique identifier called the "Intake key." The Intake key is essential for later configuration, as it references the Community, Entity, and Parser (Intake Format) used when receiving raw events on Sekoia.

  1. Go to the Sekoia Intake page.
  2. Click on the + New Intake button at the top right of the page.
  3. Search for your Intake by the product name in the search bar.
  4. Give it a Name and associate it with an Entity (and a Community if using multi-tenant mode).
  5. Click on Create.

Note

For more details on how to use the Intake page and to find the Intake key you just created, refer to this documentation.

Configure a forwarder

To forward netflow events to Sekoia, use the Sekoia.io Netflow forwarder which is the official supported way to collect netflow events. In charge of centralizing data coming from many equipments/sources and forwarding them to Sekoia.io with the appropriate format, it is a prepackaged option. You only have to provide your intake key as parameter.

Raw Events Samples

In this section, you will find examples of raw logs as generated natively by the source. These examples are provided to help integrators understand the data format before ingestion into Sekoia.io. It is crucial for setting up the correct parsing stages and ensuring that all relevant information is captured.

{
    "flowStartSysUpTime": 61588,
    "destinationIPv4Address": "5.6.7.8",
    "flowEndSysUpTime": 62004,
    "protocolIdentifier": 6,
    "tcpControlBits": 27,
    "ipVersion": 4,
    "egressInterface": 0,
    "sourceTransportPort": 443,
    "octetDeltaCount": 6561,
    "ingressInterface": 0,
    "packetDeltaCount": 12,
    "ipClassOfService": 0,
    "sourceIPv4Address": "1.2.3.4",
    "destinationTransportPort": 37500
}

{
    "IPV4_SRC_ADDR": "1.2.3.4",
    "IPV4_DST_ADDR": "5.6.7.8",
    "NEXT_HOP": 0,
    "INPUT": 0,
    "OUTPUT": 0,
    "IN_PACKETS": 17,
    "IN_OCTETS": 1732,
    "FIRST_SWITCHED": 1096510,
    "LAST_SWITCHED": 1096623,
    "SRC_PORT": 54840,
    "DST_PORT": 443,
    "TCP_FLAGS": 27,
    "PROTO": 6,
    "TOS": 0,
    "SRC_AS": 0,
    "DST_AS": 0,
    "SRC_MASK": 0,
    "DST_MASK": 0
}

{
    "IPV4_SRC_ADDR": "1.2.3.4",
    "IPV4_DST_ADDR": "5.6.7.8",
    "FIRST_SWITCHED": 662235,
    "LAST_SWITCHED": 662335,
    "IN_BYTES": 76,
    "IN_PKTS": 1,
    "INPUT_SNMP": 0,
    "OUTPUT_SNMP": 0,
    "L4_SRC_PORT": 38005,
    "L4_DST_PORT": 123,
    "PROTOCOL": 17,
    "TCP_FLAGS": 0,
    "IP_PROTOCOL_VERSION": 4,
    "SRC_TOS": 0
}

Detection section

The following section provides information for those who wish to learn more about the detection capabilities enabled by collecting this intake. It includes details about the built-in rule catalog, event categories, and ECS fields extracted from raw events. This is essential for users aiming to create custom detection rules, perform hunting activities, or pivot in the events page.

Event Categories

The following table lists the data source offered by this integration.

Data Source Description
Network device logs Cisco SD-WAN aggregates traffic packets into flow.
Network protocol analysis Cisco SD-WAN analyzes traffic at physical/data/transport layers

Transformed Events Samples after Ingestion

This section demonstrates how the raw logs will be transformed by our parsers. It shows the extracted fields that will be available for use in the built-in detection rules and hunting activities in the events page. Understanding these transformations is essential for analysts to create effective detection mechanisms with custom detection rules and to leverage the full potential of the collected data.

{
    "message": "{\"flowStartSysUpTime\":61588,\"destinationIPv4Address\":\"5.6.7.8\",\"flowEndSysUpTime\":62004,\"protocolIdentifier\":6,\"tcpControlBits\":27,\"ipVersion\":4,\"egressInterface\":0,\"sourceTransportPort\":443,\"octetDeltaCount\":6561,\"ingressInterface\":0,\"packetDeltaCount\":12,\"ipClassOfService\":0,\"sourceIPv4Address\":\"1.2.3.4\",\"destinationTransportPort\":37500}",
    "event": {
        "duration": 416000000
    },
    "cisco": {
        "sd_wan": {
            "tcp": {
                "flags": 27
            }
        }
    },
    "destination": {
        "address": "5.6.7.8",
        "ip": "5.6.7.8",
        "port": 37500
    },
    "network": {
        "bytes": 6561,
        "iana_number": "6",
        "packets": 12,
        "transport": "tcp",
        "type": "ipv4"
    },
    "related": {
        "ip": [
            "1.2.3.4",
            "5.6.7.8"
        ]
    },
    "source": {
        "address": "1.2.3.4",
        "ip": "1.2.3.4",
        "port": 443
    }
}

{
    "message": "{\"IPV4_SRC_ADDR\":\"1.2.3.4\",\"IPV4_DST_ADDR\":\"5.6.7.8\",\"NEXT_HOP\":0,\"INPUT\":0,\"OUTPUT\":0,\"IN_PACKETS\":17,\"IN_OCTETS\":1732,\"FIRST_SWITCHED\":1096510,\"LAST_SWITCHED\":1096623,\"SRC_PORT\":54840,\"DST_PORT\":443,\"TCP_FLAGS\":27,\"PROTO\":6,\"TOS\":0,\"SRC_AS\":0,\"DST_AS\":0,\"SRC_MASK\":0,\"DST_MASK\":0}",
    "event": {
        "duration": 113000000
    },
    "cisco": {
        "sd_wan": {
            "tcp": {
                "flags": 27
            }
        }
    },
    "destination": {
        "address": "5.6.7.8",
        "ip": "5.6.7.8",
        "port": 443
    },
    "network": {
        "bytes": 1732,
        "iana_number": "6",
        "packets": 17,
        "transport": "tcp",
        "type": "ipv4"
    },
    "related": {
        "ip": [
            "1.2.3.4",
            "5.6.7.8"
        ]
    },
    "source": {
        "address": "1.2.3.4",
        "ip": "1.2.3.4",
        "port": 54840
    }
}

{
    "message": "{\"IPV4_SRC_ADDR\":\"1.2.3.4\",\"IPV4_DST_ADDR\":\"5.6.7.8\",\"FIRST_SWITCHED\":662235,\"LAST_SWITCHED\":662335,\"IN_BYTES\":76,\"IN_PKTS\":1,\"INPUT_SNMP\":0,\"OUTPUT_SNMP\":0,\"L4_SRC_PORT\":38005,\"L4_DST_PORT\":123,\"PROTOCOL\":17,\"TCP_FLAGS\":0,\"IP_PROTOCOL_VERSION\":4,\"SRC_TOS\":0}",
    "event": {
        "duration": 100000000
    },
    "destination": {
        "address": "5.6.7.8",
        "ip": "5.6.7.8",
        "port": 123
    },
    "network": {
        "bytes": 76,
        "iana_number": "17",
        "packets": 1,
        "transport": "udp",
        "type": "ipv4"
    },
    "related": {
        "ip": [
            "1.2.3.4",
            "5.6.7.8"
        ]
    },
    "source": {
        "address": "1.2.3.4",
        "ip": "1.2.3.4",
        "port": 38005
    }
}

Extracted Fields

The following table lists the fields that are extracted, normalized under the ECS format, analyzed and indexed by the parser. It should be noted that infered fields are not listed.

Name Type Description
cisco.sd_wan.bgp.next_hop keyword Address of next-hop router in the BGP domain
cisco.sd_wan.next_hop keyword Address of next-hop router
cisco.sd_wan.tcp.flags number Cumulative of all the TCP flags seen for this flow
destination.as.number long Unique number allocated to the autonomous system.
destination.ip ip IP address of the destination.
destination.mac keyword MAC address of the destination.
destination.port long Port of the destination.
event.duration long Duration of the event in nanoseconds.
event.end date event.end contains the date when the event ended or when the activity was last observed.
event.start date event.start contains the date when the event started or when the activity was first observed.
http.request.method keyword HTTP request method.
http.response.mime_type keyword Mime type of the body of the response.
http.response.status_code long HTTP response status code.
http.version keyword HTTP version.
network.application keyword Application level protocol name.
network.bytes long Total bytes transferred in both directions.
network.iana_number keyword IANA Protocol Number.
network.packets long Total packets transferred in both directions.
observer.egress.interface.id keyword Interface ID
observer.ingress.interface.id keyword Interface ID
observer.ingress.interface.name keyword Interface name
source.as.number long Unique number allocated to the autonomous system.
source.ip ip IP address of the source.
source.mac keyword MAC address of the source.
source.port long Port of the source.
url.domain keyword Domain of the url.
url.path wildcard Path of the request, such as "/search".
user_agent.original keyword Unparsed user_agent string.

For more information on the Intake Format, please find the code of the Parser, Smart Descriptions, and Supported Events here.

Further readings