Set up Cloud Asset Discovery for GCP

This page explains how to set up the Cloud Asset Discovery integration to inventory assets in GCP.

• The user who gives the integration GCP permissions must be a GCP project admin.
• The Cloud Asset Discovery integration is available to all Elastic Cloud users. On-premise deployments require an appropriate subscription.
• The Cloud Asset Discovery integration is supported only on GCP, not Google Public Sector. To request support, open a GitHub issue.

You can set up Cloud Asset Discovery for GCP either by enrolling a single project, or by enrolling an organization containing multiple projects. Either way, you need to first add the integration, then enable cloud account access.

Two deployment options are available: Elastic Managed integration and agent-based.

• The Elastic Managed integration deployment allows you to collect cloud posture data without having to manage the infrastructure that collects it.
• The Agent-based deployment requires you to deploy and manage Elastic Agent in the cloud account you want to monitor.

1. Find Integrations in the navigation menu or use the global search field.
2. Search for and select Cloud asset discovery.
3. Click Add Cloud Asset Discovery.
4. Select GCP, then either GCP Organization to onboard your whole organization, or Single Project to onboard an individual account.
5. Give your integration a name that matches the purpose or team of the GCP subscription/organization you want to monitor, for example, dev-gcp-account.
6. In Deployment options, select the deployment mode:
   • Serverless Preview Elastic Cloud Serverless projects are autoscaled environments, fully managed by Elastic and available on Elastic Cloud. Availability Preview This functionality is in technical preview and is ready for evaluation. Use with caution in production; it is not recommended for mission-critical workloads. Elastic will work to fix any issues, but features in technical preview are not subject to the support SLA of official GA features. Specific Support terms apply. Serverless interfaces and procedures might differ from classic Elastic Stack deployments. Stack Preview 9.5+ The Elastic Stack includes Elastic's core products such as Elasticsearch, Kibana, Logstash, and Beats. Availability Preview since 9.5 This functionality is in technical preview and is ready for evaluation. Use with caution in production; it is not recommended for mission-critical workloads. Elastic will work to fix any issues, but features in technical preview are not subject to the support SLA of official GA features. Specific Support terms apply. Unless stated otherwise on the page, this functionality is available when your Elastic Stack is deployed on Elastic Cloud Hosted, Elastic Cloud Enterprise, Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes, and self-managed environments. This documentation corresponds to the latest patch available for each minor version. If you're not using the latest patch, check the release notes for changes. Select Elastic Managed Integration.
   • Stack Preview 9.1-9.4 The Elastic Stack includes Elastic's core products such as Elasticsearch, Kibana, Logstash, and Beats. Availability Preview from 9.1 to 9.4 This functionality is in technical preview and is ready for evaluation. Use with caution in production; it is not recommended for mission-critical workloads. Elastic will work to fix any issues, but features in technical preview are not subject to the support SLA of official GA features. Specific Support terms apply. Unless stated otherwise on the page, this functionality is available when your Elastic Stack is deployed on Elastic Cloud Hosted, Elastic Cloud Enterprise, Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes, and self-managed environments. This documentation corresponds to the latest patch available for each minor version. If you're not using the latest patch, check the release notes for changes. Select Agentless.
7. Next, you’ll need to authenticate to GCP. Expand the Steps to Generate GCP Account Credentials section, then follow the instructions that appear to automatically create the necessary credentials using Google Cloud Shell.
8. Once you’ve provided the necessary credentials, click Save and continue to finish deployment. Your data should start to appear within a few minutes.

1. Find Integrations in the navigation menu or use the global search field.
2. Search for and select Cloud asset discovery.
3. Click Add Cloud Asset Discovery.
4. In Configure integration, select GCP, then either GCP Organization (recommended) or Single Project.
5. Give your integration a name that matches the purpose or team of the GCP account you want to monitor, for example, dev-gcp-project.

For most users, the simplest option is to use a Google Cloud Shell script to automatically provision the necessary resources and permissions in your GCP account. This method, as well as two manual options, are described next on this page.

1. In Setup Access, select Google Cloud Shell. Enter your GCP Project ID, and for GCP Organization deployments, your GCP Organization ID.

2. In Where to add this integration:

   1. Select New Hosts.
   2. Name the Elastic Agent policy. Use a name that matches the purpose or team of the cloud account or accounts you want to monitor. For example, dev-gcp-account.
   3. Click Save and continue, then Add Elastic Agent to your hosts. The Add agent wizard appears and provides Elastic Agent binaries, which you can download and deploy to a VM in your GCP account.

3. Click Save and continue.

4. Copy the command that appears, then click Launch Google Cloud Shell. It opens in a new window.

5. Check the box to trust Elastic’s cloudbeat repo, then click Confirm

6. In Google Cloud Shell, execute the command you copied. Once it finishes, return to Kibana and wait for the confirmation of data received from your new integration. Then you can click View Assets to see your data.

To authenticate manually to monitor a GCP organization, you’ll need to create a new GCP service account, assign it the necessary roles, generate credentials, then provide those credentials to your integration.

Use the following commands, after replacing <SA_NAME> with the name of your new service account, <ORG_ID> with your GCP organization’s ID, and <PROJECT_ID> with the GCP project ID of the project where you want to provision the compute instance that will run Cloud Asset Discovery.

Create a new service account:

gcloud iam service-accounts create <SA_NAME> \
    --description="Elastic agent service account for Cloud Asset Discovery" \
    --display-name="Elastic agent service account for Cloud Asset Discovery" \
    --project=<PROJECT_ID>

Assign the necessary roles to the service account:

gcloud organizations add-iam-policy-binding <ORG_ID> \
    --member=serviceAccount:<SA_NAME>@<PROJECT_ID>.iam.gserviceaccount.com \
    --role=roles/cloudasset.viewer

gcloud organizations add-iam-policy-binding <ORG_ID> \
    --member=serviceAccount:<SA_NAME>@<PROJECT_ID>.iam.gserviceaccount.com \
    --role=roles/browser

Download the credentials JSON (first, replace <KEY_FILE> with the location where you want to save it):

gcloud iam service-accounts keys create <KEY_FILE> \
    --iam-account=<SA_NAME>@<PROJECT_ID>.iam.gserviceaccount.com

Keep the credentials JSON in a secure location; you will need it later.

Provide credentials to the Cloud Asset Discovery integration:

1. On the Cloud Asset Discovery integration setup screen in Setup Access, select Manual.
2. Enter your GCP Organization ID. Enter the GCP Project ID of the project where you want to provision the compute instance that will run Cloud Asset Discovery.
3. In Credential, select Credentials JSON and enter the value you generated earlier.
4. In Where to add this integration, select New Hosts.
5. Name the Elastic Agent policy. Use a name that matches the purpose or team of the cloud account or accounts you want to monitor. For example, dev-gcp-account.
6. Click Save and continue, then follow the instructions to install Elastic Agent in your chosen GCP project.

Wait for the confirmation that Kibana received data from your new integration. Then you can click View Assets to see your data.

To authenticate manually to monitor an individual GCP project, you’ll need to create a new GCP service account, assign it the necessary roles, generate credentials, then provide those credentials to the Cloud Asset Discovery integration.

Use the following commands, after replacing <SA_NAME> with the name of your new service account, and <PROJECT_ID> with your GCP project ID.

Create a new service account:

gcloud iam service-accounts create <SA_NAME> \
    --description="Elastic agent service account for Cloud Asset Discovery" \
    --display-name="Elastic agent service account for Cloud Asset Discovery" \
    --project=<PROJECT_ID>

Assign the necessary roles to the service account:

gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding <PROJECT_ID> \
    --member=serviceAccount:<SA_NAME>@<PROJECT_ID>.iam.gserviceaccount.com \
    --role=roles/cloudasset.viewer

gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding <PROJECT_ID> \
    --member=serviceAccount:<SA_NAME>@<PROJECT_ID>.iam.gserviceaccount.com \
    --role=roles/browser

Download the credentials JSON (first, replace <KEY_FILE> with the location where you want to save it):

gcloud iam service-accounts keys create <KEY_FILE> \
    --iam-account=<SA_NAME>@<PROJECT_ID>.iam.gserviceaccount.com

Keep the credentials JSON in a secure location; you will need it later.

Provide credentials to the Cloud Asset Discovery integration:

1. On the Cloud Asset Discovery setup screen in Setup Access, select Manual.
2. Enter your GCP Project ID.
3. For Credential, select Credentials JSON, and enter the value you generated earlier.
4. For Where to add this integration, select New Hosts.
5. Name the Elastic Agent policy. Use a name that matches the purpose or team of the cloud account or accounts you want to monitor. For example, dev-gcp-account.
6. Click Save and continue, then follow the instructions to install Elastic Agent in your chosen GCP project.

Wait for the confirmation that Kibana received data from your new integration. Then you can click View Assets to see your data.