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Unexplained solution imports in United Kingdom environment

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Posted on by cd09

Hi,
We have a client with a Dynamics 365 environment in the United Kingdom region. Twice within the past year, the environment has experienced an unexplained re-import of an existing unmanaged solution in Production that the client frequently deploys via an Azure DevOps pipeline. The pipeline has no history of running on the dates that this occurred though. Strangely, an export of the solution occurred shortly after the first time this occurred. MS support has no telemetry logs of the unexplained imports (although the logs show every explainable import!) and they are not able to assist with identifying the cause nor how to prevent this from occurring again (we've opened multiple MS support tickets). One thing I noticed is that there is no 'activityid' tied to the 2 unexplained imports. From research, it appears that sometimes when MS imports their solutions, they also have no activityid.

The client has Dynamics orgs that reside in other regions of the world which have not experienced this issue. It's unclear what has caused the 2 imports and how to prevent them, other than blocking all unmanaged customizations via the settings. This setting will need to be temporarily disabled each month to allow the client to deploy the latest version though. Our team moved away from using managed solutions for various reasons.

Has anyone else seen this or know how we can capture information on who/what triggered these imports? Thanks for any insights.

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Microsoft Dataverse with Power Apps

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bscarlavai33 738 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at

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Are you looking at the Import Jobs table? It has a Created/Modified By that could potentially help to see which user/account is doing the import.

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VASANTH KUMAR BALMADI 266 on at

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Hi,

This issue is puzzling and raises concerns about visibility into the Dynamics 365 environment's operations. Here are some possible reasons and strategies to diagnose and mitigate such unexplained solution imports:

Possible Causes

Background Microsoft Operations:

Microsoft may perform background maintenance or updates to the environment (e.g., applying patches, updates to built-in solutions) that trigger solution imports. Such operations might not generate activityid logs visible to admins.

Custom Automation or Third-Party Tools:

If third-party tools or custom automations are configured to interact with the Dynamics 365 environment, they might inadvertently trigger solution imports.

User Actions:

It's possible that a user with appropriate permissions accidentally or intentionally triggered the import without proper documentation or awareness.

Azure DevOps Pipelines:

While your pipeline logs don’t show activity, there could still be misconfigured triggers or parallel environments (e.g., another pipeline or an unmanaged process) interacting with the environment.

Regional Dynamics 365 Instance Issues:

The issue may be region-specific, particularly if Microsoft hosts the UK instance on different infrastructure or has unique operations for that region.

Investigation and Diagnostics

1. Audit Logs

Enable and review detailed Audit Logs in Dynamics 365 to track all solution imports. Look for:

Timestamps matching the unexplained imports.

The user or system identity tied to these imports.

2. Power Platform Admin Center

Use the Power Platform Admin Center to examine all recent activities, especially solution imports, during the dates of the unexplained imports.

3. Azure Activity Logs

If the pipeline is integrated with Azure DevOps, review Azure Activity Logs for any API calls or operations performed against the environment during those times.

4. Monitoring for API Calls

Use a tool like Application Insights or a logging middleware to monitor API calls made to your Dynamics 365 instance. Unexpected imports might correlate with API calls that you can trace back to their source.

5. Telemetry via Plugin Registration

Create a plugin triggered on solution imports and log the user and other relevant details, such as the origin of the import (e.g., Azure DevOps, Power Platform Admin Center).

6. Microsoft Support - Escalation

Push for an escalation with Microsoft Support to investigate further. Highlight the lack of activityid as unusual and request internal engineering insights into telemetry logs or backend operations.

Prevention and Mitigation

Restrict Solution Imports:

Temporarily disable unmanaged customizations except during deployment windows. While inconvenient, this will prevent unauthorized solution imports.

Environment Separation:

Use a dedicated deployment environment for testing and validation before importing into Production. Limit deployment access to specific users.

Audit & Alerting:

Enable detailed auditing and set up alerts for solution import activities. Tools like Power Automate can trigger notifications when specific events occur.

Regional Dynamics Validation:

Investigate differences in configurations or operations between the UK environment and others. This could include:

Differences in service levels.

Specific updates applied to the UK region.

Review Azure DevOps Pipeline Triggers:

Confirm no inadvertent or undocumented triggers exist that might kick off imports. Validate pipeline permissions and scheduling thoroughly.

Capturing Future Events

Implement a system to capture and log detailed metadata for all solution imports:

Use a plugin or a Power Automate flow to log:

Solution Name

Timestamp

Initiator

Source (e.g., manual, API, Azure DevOps)

This way, even if Microsoft logs fail to capture it, your custom logs might provide insights.

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cd09 2 on at

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Thank you for the replies! I looked into a few of the suggestions, but have a few questions:

For the Dynamics 365 auditing, is there a setting somewhere we need to configure to audit solution imports? They currently have auditing enabled in the org, but I don't see an event for "solution" or "import"

Do you have links to any documentation on how we would set up a power automate flow or a plugin to capture the solution initiator and source? I couldn't find a trigger for "solution imported" in power automate. For a plugin, I found an "ImportSolution" message that can be used on a registered step. I believe we could capture the initiator from the calling user, but is there a recommended class in the SDK to capture more details, like the source?

I'm not sure if the ImportJobs table was examined when the unexplained imports occurred, but currently it only shows 1 row for an import of that solution (a recent import that was triggered via the Azure Pipeline). I'll recommend this as a troubleshooting step if this issue occurs again.

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