Summarizing Detective Investigations
Overview
Produces structured summaries of Amazon Detective investigations and finding groups. Aggregates investigation status, severity distributions, and indicator types to give operators a rapid understanding of their investigation landscape.
Detective builds behavior graphs from CloudTrail management events, VPC Flow Logs, EKS Audit Logs, and Security Hub findings. Detective does NOT support S3 data events.
Works from both standalone and delegated administrator accounts.
Classify the Request
| User intent | Workflow |
|---|---|
| "Show me Detective investigations" | A: Active Investigations Summary |
| "Details on a specific investigation" | B: Investigation Detail |
Workflow A: Active Investigations Summary
Obtain the graph ARN:
aws detective list-graphsIf no graphs, report Detective not configured and stop.
List investigations:
aws detective list-investigations --graph-arn <graph-arn> --filter-criteria '{}'Group results by
Status(RUNNING, SUCCESSFUL, FAILED) andSeverity(CRITICAL, HIGH, MEDIUM, LOW, INFORMATIONAL).Present results:
Status Severity Count Most Recent RUNNING HIGH 3 inv-abc123 (2024-01-15) MUST include total counts per status category.
SHOULD note if any investigations are in FAILED state.
MAY paginate using NextToken if results exceed page size.
Workflow B: Investigation Detail
Get investigation details:
aws detective get-investigation --graph-arn <graph-arn> --investigation-id <id>List indicators:
aws detective list-indicators --graph-arn <graph-arn> --investigation-id <id>Group indicators by whatever
IndicatorTypevalues the API returns. Do not validate against a fixed list — report all types present in the response.For reference on indicator types, see: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/detective/latest/userguide/investigations-report-understand.html
Present summary:
Indicator Type Count TTP_OBSERVED 5 FLAGGED_IP_ADDRESS 2 RELATED_FINDING_GROUP 1 MUST include
EntityTypeandEntityArnfrom investigation detail.MUST NOT perform follow-up investigation on flagged entities.
Constraints
- MUST NOT perform investigation actions (e.g., start-investigation)
- MUST NOT make threat assessments or attribution claims
- MUST NOT include raw IP addresses unless user explicitly requests IOC data
- SHOULD present data as-is without interpretation beyond grouping
- MUST handle AccessDeniedException gracefully
Troubleshooting
| Issue | Resolution |
|---|---|
| GraphArn not known | Use list-graphs to discover available graphs |
| Empty investigation list | Confirm Detective is enabled and has processed data |
| AccessDeniedException | Verify caller is Detective administrator |
| FAILED investigations | Note in summary — may indicate entity resolution issues |
Output Sensitivity
Investigation details contain AWS account IDs, IAM principal ARNs under investigation, flagged IP addresses, geolocation data, user agent strings, and related finding references. Present investigation status/severity summary first. Display full indicator details only when the caller explicitly requests raw output.