Ensure No Auditing for 'Audit Policy: Policy Change: MPSSVC Rule-Level Policy Change' This subcategory reports changes in policy rules used by the Microsoft Protection Service (MPSSVC.exe). This service is used by Windows Firewall and by Microsoft OneCare. Events for this subcategory include: - 4944: The following policy was active when the Windows Firewall started. - 4945: A rule was listed when the Windows Firewall started. - 4946: A change has been made to Windows Firewall exception list. A rule was added. - 4947: A change has been made to Windows Firewall exception list. A rule was modified. - 4948: A change has been made to Windows Firewall exception list. A rule was deleted. - 4949: Windows Firewall settings were restored to the default values. - 4950: A Windows Firewall setting has changed. - 4951: A rule has been ignored because its major version number was not recognized by Windows Firewall. - 4952 : Parts of a rule have been ignored because its minor version number was not recognized by Windows Firewall. The other parts of the rule will be enforced. - 4953: A rule has been ignored by Windows Firewall because it could not parse the rule. - 4954: Windows Firewall Group Policy settings have changed. The new settings have been applied. - 4956: Windows Firewall has changed the active profile. - 4957: Windows Firewall did not apply the following rule: - 4958: Windows Firewall did not apply the following rule because the rule referred to items not configured on this computer: Refer to the Microsoft Knowledgebase article "Description of security events in Windows Vista and in Windows Server 2008" for the most recent information about this setting: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/947226. Counter Measure: Enable Audit policy settings that support the organizational security policy for all the computers in your organization. Identify the components that you need for an audit policy that enables your organization to hold users accountable for their actions while using organizational resources and enables IT departments to detect unauthorized activity efficiently and then track those events in log files. Potential Impact: If no audit settings are configured, or if audit settings are too lax on the computers in your organization, security incidents might not be detected or not enough evidence will be available for network forensic analysis after security incidents occur. However, if audit settings are too severe, critically important entries in the Security log may be obscured by all of the meaningless entries and computer performance and the available amount of data storage may be seriously affected. Companies that operate in certain regulated industries may have legal obligations to log certain events or activities.

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(1) GPO: Computer ConfigurationWindows SettingsSecurity SettingsAdvanced Audit Policy ConfigurationAudit PoliciesPolicy ChangeAudit Policy: Policy Change: MPSSVC Rule-Level Policy Change