Session-level audit logging in YSQL

Enable session-level audit

Session logging is enabled for per user session basis. Enable session logging for all DML and DDL statements and log all relations in DML statements.

set pgaudit.log = 'write, ddl';
set pgaudit.log_relation = on;

Enable session logging for all commands except MISC and raise audit log messages as NOTICE.

Example

In this example session audit logging is used for logging DDL and SELECT statements. Note that the insert statement is not logged because the WRITE class is not enabled.

SQL statements are shown below.

Step 1. Connect using ysql

Open the YSQL shell (ysqlsh), specifying the yugabyte user and prompting for the password.

$ ./ysqlsh -U yugabyte -W

When prompted for the password, enter the yugabyte password. You should be able to login and see a response like below.

ysqlsh (11.2-YB-2.5.0.0-b0)
Type "help" for help.

yugabyte=#

Step 2. Enable pgaudit extension

Enable pgaudit extension on the YugabyteDB cluster.

\c yugabyte yugabyte;
CREATE EXTENSION IF NOT EXISTS pgaudit;

Step 3. Enable session audit logging

Enable session audit logging in YugabyteDB cluster.

set pgaudit.log = 'read, ddl';

Step 4. Perform statements

create table account
(
    id int,
    name text,
    password text,
    description text
);

insert into account (id, name, password, description)
             values (1, 'user1', 'HASH1', 'blah, blah');

select *
    from account;

Step 5. Verify output

You should output similar to the following in the logs:

2020-11-09 19:19:09.262 UTC [3710] LOG:  AUDIT: SESSION,1,1,DDL,CREATE
TABLE,TABLE,public.account,"create table account
        (
            id int,
            name text,
            password text,
            description text
        );",<not logged>
2020-11-09 19:19:19.619 UTC [3710] LOG:  AUDIT: SESSION,2,1,READ,SELECT,,,"select *
            from account;",<not logged>