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MailItemsAccessed throttling [Nobelium]

The MailItemsAccessed action is part of the new Advanced Audit functionality of Microsoft 365 Defender. It's part of Exchange mailbox auditing and is enabled by default for users that have an Office 365 or Microsoft 365 E5 license, or for organizations with a Microsoft 365 E5 Compliance add-on subscription.

Detection Query

let starttime = 1d;
CloudAppEvents
| where Timestamp between (startofday(ago(starttime))..now())
| where ActionType == "MailItemsAccessed"
| extend isThrottled=RawEventData['OperationProperties'][1]
| where isnotempty(RawEventData['ClientAppId'] ) and isThrottled has "True" and RawEventData['AppId'] has "00000003-0000-0000-c000-000000000000"//GrapAPI Id
| project Timestamp, RawEventData['OrganizationId'],AccountObjectId,UserAgent

Data Sources

CloudAppEvents

Platforms

microsoft-defender

Tags

exfiltrationanomaly
Raw Content
# MailItemsAccessed throttling [Nobelium]

The MailItemsAccessed action is part of the new Advanced Audit functionality of Microsoft 365 Defender. It's part of Exchange mailbox auditing and is enabled by default for users that have an Office 365 or Microsoft 365 E5 license, or for organizations with a Microsoft 365 E5 Compliance add-on subscription.

If more than 1,000 MailItemsAccessed audit records are generated in less than 24 hours, Exchange Online will stop generating auditing records for MailItemsAccessed activity. When a mailbox is throttled, MailItemsAccessed activity will not be logged for 24 hours after the mailbox was throttled. If this occurs, there's a potential that mailbox could have been compromised during this period. The recording of MailItemsAccessed activity will be resumed following a 24-hour period.

The query is looking for MailItemsAccessed Throttling events where the operation is done by a ClientApplication.

See [*The MailItemsAccessed mailbox auditing action*](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/mailitemsaccessed-forensics-investigations?view=o365-worldwide#the-mailitemsaccessed-mailbox-auditing-action).

## Query

```Kusto
let starttime = 1d;
CloudAppEvents
| where Timestamp between (startofday(ago(starttime))..now())
| where ActionType == "MailItemsAccessed"
| extend isThrottled=RawEventData['OperationProperties'][1]
| where isnotempty(RawEventData['ClientAppId'] ) and isThrottled has "True" and RawEventData['AppId'] has "00000003-0000-0000-c000-000000000000"//GrapAPI Id
| project Timestamp, RawEventData['OrganizationId'],AccountObjectId,UserAgent

```

## Category

This query can be used to detect the following attack techniques and tactics ([see MITRE ATT&CK framework](https://attack.mitre.org/)) or security configuration states.
| Technique, tactic, or state | Covered? (v=yes) | Notes |
|------------------------|----------|-------|
| Initial access |  |  |
| Execution |  |  |
| Persistence | |  |
| Privilege escalation |  |  |
| Defense evasion |  |  |
| Credential Access |  |  |
| Discovery |  |  |
| Lateral movement |  |  |
| Collection |  |  |
| Command and control |  |  |
| Exfiltration | V |  |
| Impact |  |  |
| Vulnerability |  |  |
| Misconfiguration |  |  |
| Malware, component |  |  |

## See also

* [Locate Nobelium implant receiving DNS response](../Campaigns/c2-lookup-from-nonbrowser[Nobelium].md)
* [Locate Nobelium implant receiving DNS response](../Campaigns/c2-lookup-response[Nobelium].md)
* [Compromised certificate [Nobelium]](../Campaigns/compromised-certificate[Nobelium].md)
* [FireEye Red Team tool CVEs [Nobelium]](../Campaigns/fireeye-red-team-tools-CVEs%20[Nobelium].md)
* [FireEye Red Team tool HASHs [Nobelium]](../Campaigns/fireeye-red-team-tools-HASHs%20[Nobelium].md)
* [View data on software identified as affected by Nobelium campaign](../Campaigns/known-affected-software-orion[Nobelium].md)
* [Locate SolarWinds processes launching suspicious PowerShell commands](../Campaigns/launching-base64-powershell[Nobelium].md)
* [Locate SolarWinds processes launching command prompt with the echo command](../Campaigns/launching-cmd-echo[Nobelium].md)
* [Locate Nobelium-related malicious DLLs created in the system or locally](../Campaigns/locate-dll-created-locally[Nobelium].md)
* [Locate Nobelium-related malicious DLLs loaded in memory](../Campaigns/locate-dll-loaded-in-memory[Nobelium].md)
* [Get an inventory of SolarWinds Orion software possibly affected by Nobelium](../Campaigns/possible-affected-software-orion[Nobelium].md)
* [Anomalous use of MailItemAccess on other users' mailboxes [Nobelium]](../Collection/Anomaly%20of%20MailItemAccess%20by%20Other%20Users%20Mailbox%20[Nobelium].md)
* [Nobelium campaign DNS pattern](../Command%20and%20Control/DNSPattern%20[Nobelium].md)
* [Nobelium encoded domain in URL](../Command%20and%20Control/EncodedDomainURL%20[Nobelium].md)
* [Domain federation trust settings modified](../Defense%20evasion/ADFSDomainTrustMods[Nobelium].md)
* [Discovering potentially tampered devices [Nobelium]](../Defense%20evasion/Discovering%20potentially%20tampered%20devices%20[Nobelium].md)
* [Mail.Read or Mail.ReadWrite permissions added to OAuth application](../Defense%20evasion/MailPermissionsAddedToApplication[Nobelium].md)
* [Suspicious enumeration using Adfind tool](../Discovery/SuspiciousEnumerationUsingAdfind[Nobelium].md)
* [Anomalous use of MailItemAccess by GraphAPI [Nobelium]](./Anomaly%20of%20MailItemAccess%20by%20GraphAPI%20[Nobelium].md)
* [OAuth apps accessing user mail via GraphAPI [Nobelium]](./OAuth%20Apps%20accessing%20user%20mail%20via%20GraphAPI%20[Nobelium].md)
* [OAuth apps reading mail via GraphAPI and directly [Nobelium]](./OAuth%20Apps%20reading%20mail%20both%20via%20GraphAPI%20and%20directly%20[Nobelium].md)
* [OAuth apps reading mail via GraphAPI anomaly [Nobelium]](./OAuth%20Apps%20reading%20mail%20via%20GraphAPI%20anomaly%20[Nobelium].md)
* [Credentials were added to an Azure AD application after 'Admin Consent' permissions granted [Nobelium]](../Persistence/CredentialsAddAfterAdminConsentedToApp[Nobelium].md)
* [New access credential added to application or service principal](../Persistence/NewAppOrServicePrincipalCredential[Nobelium].md)
* [Add uncommon credential type to application [Nobelium]](../Privilege%20escalation/Add%20uncommon%20credential%20type%20to%20application%20[Nobelium].md)
* [ServicePrincipalAddedToRole [Nobelium]](../Privilege%20escalation/ServicePrincipalAddedToRole%20[Nobelium].md)

## Contributor info

**Contributor:** Shilo Yair
**GitHub alias:** shilo.yair
**Organization:** Microsoft 365 Defender
**Contact info:** shyair@microsoft.com