Strategic Windows Event Routing with Bindplane

Windows event logs can provide valuable insight into day-to-day operations and potential security issues. But making sense of that data—and getting it to the right place without overloading your systems or driving up costs—takes some planning.

Bindplane helps with this by providing a flexible way to collect, process, and route Windows events. It’s designed to support security and compliance needs without adding unnecessary complexity.

With the introduction of Google Cloud’s Security Operations (SecOps), alongside Cloud Monitoring and logging (and the rest of the observability suite), there’s now a more integrated way to handle observability and security operations in the Google Cloud ecosystem. This guide walks through how to route Windows event data based on event type and organizational requirements, using Google Cloud’s tools as examples.

Understanding Windows Event Categories

Before figuring out how to route Windows event data, it helps to know how these logs are organized. By default, Windows logs are split into three main channels:

1. System Events cover system-level activity, like service startups, shutdowns, and other OS operations.
2. Application Events capture activity from applications running on the machine, such as errors, warnings, or other app-specific messages.
3. Security Events contain login attempts, permission changes, and other security-related actions.

For most environments, these three channels cover the most useful data. Third-party apps usually follow the same structure—system-related events go to the System log, security events go to Security, etc. Note that there are other useful events from custom channels, but I’ll touch on that in a different post.

Routing Windows Events: Three Practical Paths

In this example setup, we’ve built a routing configuration that handles three needs: security, observability, and compliance. Each route is designed to send the right data to the right place without overwhelming teams with noise or unnecessary detail.

1. Security Events → Google SecOps

Security teams need to see relevant alerts as quickly as possible to catch and respond to threats early. Using BindPlane’s attribute-based routing, we send security-related events directly to SecOps tools. This helps reduce noise, so analysts can focus on what matters without digging through unrelated logs.

2. System & Application Events → Google Cloud Logging

The priority for IT and ops teams is system health and application performance. We route system and application events into Google Cloud Logging, where they can be monitored using Google Cloud’s observability tools. This keeps security logs out of the way and makes tracking reliability issues or troubleshooting application behavior easier.

3. All Events (Long-Term Retention) → Google Cloud Storage

Some logs must stick around for a long time, especially in regulated industries like finance or healthcare. For example, HIPAA requires six years of data retention; European financial organizations often need to retain logs for seven years; in some Asian locales, as many as 10 years can be required. Further, it’s also helpful to implement as a ‘catch-all’ to ensure useful events aren’t accidentally routed into the abyss. To handle this, we route a copy of all relevant logs to Google Cloud Storage in this example, which provides a cost-effective way to store them securely and access them later if needed.

Key Components: Processors and Connectors

Beyond Bindplane’s use of OpenTelemetry receivers and exporters to gather and ship Windows events, processors and connectors are essential for establishing complex routes and making the data digestible at each targeted destination. Here some some key OpenTelemetry components in Bindplane to familiarize yourself with:

1. Routing Connector and Bindplane Data Routing v2

With the recent addition of the Routing Connector to the collector’s connector library (side note: there’s definitely a better way to describe this, and also, say this 5 times quickly), the collector can route logs, metrics, or traces to different pipelines based on their attributes.

The Routing Connector also powers Bindplane’s Data Routing v2, which enables users to visually connect Sources, Processor Nodes, and Destinations within Bindplane’s configuration UI. Establishing this connection in the UI automatically updates the underlying OpenTelemetry configuration, drastically simplifying the user's routing experience.

To utilize the Routing Connector, you write simple conditions using OpenTelemetry’s Transformation Language (OTTL) to decide where each piece of data should go. It’s a flexible way to ensure the right data ends up in the right place, whether for security, observability, or long-term storage. Here’s how it looks in Bindplane’s configuration, where application and security logs are being split between Google SecOps and Cloud Logging:

Routing Order Considerations

One other note: ensure you’re keeping an eye on the order of our routing rules. Similar to firewall rules, BindPlane evaluates routing conditions sequentially:

• The system first attempts to match the first rule
• If no match is found, it proceeds to the next rule
• This process continues until a match is found.

2. Batch Processor

The Batch Processor is key for shipping large volumes of data to any destination, including Google Cloud. For most implementations, the default batch processing settings will suffice. The OpenTelemetry collector is designed to handle typical enterprise volumes efficiently with these settings. Combined with the Routing Connector, the batch size can be adjusted independently for each route, or destination.

3. SecOps Standardization Processor

Unique to Google SecOps, the SecOps Standardization processor ensures consistent formatting and adds critical context to your logs to streamline the setup and configuration of OpenTelemetry collectors managed by Bindplane. Here are some of the parameters set to streamline configuration:

• Log Type Identification: Properly identify Windows event logs
• Namespace Definition: Implement namespaces for better internal sorting
• Ingestion Labels: Add contextual information such as:
  • Application name
  • Data center location
  • Customer name
  • Ingestion source

It’s also worth noting that leveraging ingestion labels is required to take advantage of Silent Host Monitoring in SecOps, enabling users to create alerts to monitor changes in ingestion rates in Google Cloud Monitoring. Cool and powerful stuff!

Other Useful Tips re: Windows Events

When you’re setting up Windows Event routing in Bindplane, here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Set log collection to "raw logs" when working with Google SecOps, or other SIEM platforms
• Set the reader to “start at the beginning” if you need to pull in older events, not just the new ones. This is great for catching up on missed logs.
• If you're using Custom Windows event channels - Bindplane makes it simple to gather events from custom channels as well with the Windows Event source.

Wrapping Up

By directing Windows event logs to the appropriate destinations—security events to SecOps, application and system events to IT operations, and everything to long-term storage—organizations can satisfy the needs of multiple stakeholders while maintaining compliance.

The attribute-based routing, combined with proper processing techniques, ensures that each team receives the data they need in the expected format. As data volumes grow and compliance requirements become more stringent, this type of intelligent routing will become increasingly valuable for enterprise log management.

Whether you're managing Windows events for a financial institution with strict compliance requirements or any organization seeking to optimize its logging infrastructure, BindPlane's routing capabilities provide a flexible, powerful solution for today's complex data environments.