PagerDuty Data Connector

The BigPanda Unified Data Connector (UDC) syncs incident history from PagerDuty to provide context and insights for AI Incident Assistant (Biggy), AI Incident Prevention, and AI Detection and Response. The connector ingests every PagerDuty incident along with its full activity history, so BigPanda can see how incidents moved between teams and who ultimately worked and resolved them. Ingested data is securely stored and made available in the IT Knowledge Graph (ITKG).

The connector also syncs your PagerDuty routing configuration: services, escalation policies, teams, and team memberships.

Not bi-directional sync

The data connector only reads data from PagerDuty. It does not share BigPanda incidents to PagerDuty or sync incident updates back.

Synced data

The connector syncs PagerDuty incidents and the reference tables listed below. Each incident record includes its related data, so the full history of an incident is in a single record and you don't need to join tables. The incidents table is always included.

Table	Contents	Sync behavior
`incidents`	PagerDuty incidents, including status, urgency, service, escalation policy, and assignees. Each record also includes the incident's related data. See Incident related data.	The connector fetches the latest state of each incident, including its related data, every time the incident changes.
`services`	PagerDuty services.	Full snapshot on every run.
`escalation_policies`	Escalation policies and their rules.	Full snapshot on every run.
`teams`	PagerDuty teams.	Full snapshot on every run. Requires the Teams feature on your PagerDuty plan.
`team_members`	The users in each team and their roles.	Full snapshot on every run. Requires the Teams feature on your PagerDuty plan.

All timestamps are in UTC.

The connector supports both historical and incremental sync. We recommend using both: a historical sync to backfill past incidents, then incremental sync to keep the data current.

Incident related data

Each incident record can include the following related data. By default, all three are included, and at least one must stay selected.

Related data	Contents
Log entries	The incident's activity history, including every assign, reassign, escalate, and resolve event, ordered from oldest to newest.
Notes	Notes that responders added to the incident, ordered from oldest to newest. Notes with the same timestamp keep the order they were added in.
Alerts	Alerts attached to the incident.

Log entries don't include notification entries, such as records of who was paged and whether by phone or email. These entries contain contact details and aren't part of the incident's history.

Embedded incident data

Each row in the incidents table can include related records, so you can see how an incident moved, what responders noted, and which alerts belong to it without joining separate tables.

rel_log_entries: The incident’s activity history, oldest first, including assign and escalate events. Notification entries aren’t included. To see notification entries, use the log_entries table.
rel_notes: The notes added to the incident. Embedded notes don’t include incident_id.
rel_alerts: The alerts attached to the incident. If the incident has no alerts, this is an empty list.

The service and teams fields on every incident are full records. Assignee fields remain short references, with the user’s name as the summary.

By default, all three relations are embedded. To choose which ones are included, see the Related tables option in Sync preferences

Authentication

The PagerDuty connector authenticates with a PagerDuty REST API key. A read-only key is all the connector needs. Create the key, then send it to your BigPanda account team along with your instance URL. Keys are stored securely on the BigPanda side and are never logged or echoed back in the connector configuration.

PagerDuty supports two types of REST API keys:

Key type	Description
Account API key (recommended)	Tied to your PagerDuty account rather than a person, so it keeps working if team members leave. It can read all data in the account. Only PagerDuty Admins and Account Owners can create one.
User API token	Tied to an individual user. The connector can only see the data that user can see, and the token stops working if the user is removed from PagerDuty.

For more information on PagerDuty key types, see the PagerDuty authentication documentation.

Create a read-only account API key

In PagerDuty, open the Integrations menu and select API Access Keys.
Click Create New API Key.
In the Description field, enter a name that identifies the key, such as BigPanda Unified Data Connector.
Select the Read-only API Key checkbox.
Click Create Key.
Copy the key and store it somewhere secure. PagerDuty only displays the key once.

Instance URL

The instance URL depends on the service region of your PagerDuty account:

Service region	Instance URL
US (default)	`https://api.pagerduty.com`
EU	`https://api.eu.pagerduty.com`

Match the instance URL to your region

If the instance URL doesn't match your account's service region, PagerDuty rejects the key with a 401 Unauthorized response.

Sync preferences

Provide the following information about your sync preferences to BigPanda.

Required configuration

Option	Description
Instance URL	`https://api.pagerduty.com` for US accounts, or `https://api.eu.pagerduty.com` for EU accounts.
Mode	Determine whether you'd like to set up an incremental or historical sync. We highly recommend using both modes. See the Streaming Modes section for more information.

Optional configuration

Option	Default	Description
Incident related data	Log entries, notes, and alerts	The related data to include in each incident record. At least one must stay selected. The `incidents` table is always synced.
Reference tables	-	The reference tables to sync: services, escalation policies, teams, and team members.
Related tables	All three	The related records to embed in each incident: any of `log_entries`, `notes`, and `alerts`. If you leave this empty, all three are embedded. Choosing which relations to embed doesn’t change which tables are synced. A table you select under Tables is still written even if its records aren’t embedded.
Start date	30 days ago	The date the historical sync starts from, and the starting point of the first incremental sync. We recommend syncing at least 12 months of data.

Advanced configuration

Advanced settings have defaults that work for most accounts and are collapsed in the connector configuration. Change them only if your BigPanda account team recommends it.

Option	Default	Description
Window size	24 hours	The length of each time window the connector requests log entries for.
Overlap	300 seconds	How far back each incremental run re-reads to catch late-arriving log entries. Records already loaded in the overlap are skipped, so the overlap doesn't create duplicates.
Page size	100	The number of records requested from PagerDuty in a single call. The maximum is 100.
Query limit	900	The maximum number of requests sent to PagerDuty per minute.
Timeout	-	How long the connector waits for a PagerDuty response before timing out a request.

Test the connection and configuration

Before the first sync, your BigPanda account team runs two checks from the connector setup page:

Test connection: Confirms that BigPanda can reach your PagerDuty instance with the API key and instance URL you provided.
Test configuration: Shows the number of records in each selected table for a date range you choose. Use it to confirm the expected data volume before the historical sync starts.

Check record counts before a large backfill

Run Test configuration against your planned start date to estimate how much data the historical sync will load. Large PagerDuty accounts can take longer to backfill.

Data considerations

Personal data and redaction

The incidents and team_members tables include user names and free-text that responders enter in PagerDuty. Because each incident record includes its notes, alerts, and log entries, this text can contain personal or sensitive information.

We recommend setting up data redaction for both tables before running the first sync. See the Data Redaction documentation for options on protecting sensitive data.

The connector doesn't sync notification log entries, so the contact details PagerDuty uses to page responders aren't ingested.

Teams plan requirement

The teams and team_members tables require the Teams feature on your PagerDuty plan. If your plan doesn't include Teams, PagerDuty returns a 402 Payment Required response for those tables. The connector skips teams and team_members and continues to sync all other tables normally.

Troubleshooting

401 Unauthorized on test connection: The API key is invalid, has been deleted, or doesn't match the instance URL. Confirm that the instance URL matches your account's service region, and that the key still exists under API Access Keys in PagerDuty. If needed, create a new key and send it to your BigPanda account team.
teams and team_members tables are empty: Your PagerDuty plan doesn't include the Teams feature. All other tables continue to sync. See Teams plan requirement.
Fewer records than expected: If you use a user API token, the connector only sees the services, incidents, and teams that user can access in PagerDuty. Switch to a read-only account API key to sync all data in the account.
Repeated 429 Too Many Requests responses: The connector automatically waits and retries when PagerDuty rate-limits a request. If other integrations share the same PagerDuty API limit, ask your BigPanda account team to lower the query limit.
The sync fails immediately with a validation error that mentions related tables: The Related tables setting contains a value the connector doesn’t recognize. The error lists the allowed values: log_entries, notes, and alerts. Ask your BigPanda account team to correct the setting.
rel_log_entries has fewer entries than the log_entries table: This is expected. Embedded history leaves out notification entries. The log_entries table includes them.

For general connection issues, see the Troubleshoot connection issues section of the Unified Data Connector documentation.

Next Steps

BigPanda Unified Data Connector: Learn how streaming modes work and review frequently asked questions.
Data Redaction with UDC: Protect PII and other sensitive data before it's ingested.
Unified Data Connector Configuration: Review configuration options shared across all data connectors.
ServiceNow Data Connector: Sync ITSM data alongside your PagerDuty incident history.

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