18.9.78.1 Ensure 'Allow auditing events in Windows Defender Application Guard' is set to 'Enabled'

Information

This policy setting allows you to decide whether auditing events can be collected from Windows Defender Application Guard (WDAG).

The recommended state for this setting is: Enabled.

Note: WDAG requires a 64-bit version of Windows and a CPU supporting hardware-assisted CPU virtualization (Intel VT-x or AMD-V). This feature is not officially supported on virtual hardware, although it can work on VMs (especially for testing) provided that the hardware-assisted CPU virtualization feature is exposed by the host to the guest VM.

More information on system requirements for this feature can be found at this link:

System requirements for Windows Defender Application Guard (Windows 10) | Microsoft Docs

Rationale:

Auditing of Windows Defender Application Guard (WDAG) events may be useful when investigating a security incident.

Solution

To establish the recommended configuration via GP, set the following UI path to Enabled:

Computer Configuration\Policies\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Windows Defender Application Guard\Allow auditing events in Windows Defender Application Guard

Note: This Group Policy path may not exist by default. It is provided by the Group Policy template AppHVSI.admx/adml that is included with the Microsoft Windows 10 Release 1709 Administrative Templates (or newer).

Impact:

Windows Defender Application Guard (WDAG) will inherit its auditing policies from Microsoft Edge and start to audit system events specifically for WDAG. Collected logs are available for review on Microsoft Edge, outside of Application Guard.

Default Value:

Disabled. (Audit event logs aren't collected for Windows Defender Application Guard.)

See Also

https://workbench.cisecurity.org/files/2651