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Description

The following analytic identifies WmiPrvSE.exe spawning a process. This typically occurs when a process is instantiated from a local or remote process using wmic.exe. During triage, review parallel processes for suspicious behavior or commands executed. Review the process and command-line spawning from wmiprvse.exe. Contain and remediate the endpoint as necessary.

  • Type: TTP
  • Product: Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Enterprise Security, Splunk Cloud
  • Datamodel: Endpoint
  • Last Updated: 2020-03-16
  • Author: Rico Valdez, Michael Haag, Splunk
  • ID: 24869767-8579-485d-9a4f-d9ddfd8f0cac

Annotations

ATT&CK

ATT&CK

ID Technique Tactic
T1047 Windows Management Instrumentation Execution
Kill Chain Phase
  • Installation
NIST
  • DE.CM
CIS20
  • CIS 10
CVE
1
2
3
4
5
6
| tstats `security_content_summariesonly` count min(_time) as firstTime max(_time) as lastTime from datamodel=Endpoint.Processes where Processes.parent_process_name=WmiPrvSE.exe by Processes.dest Processes.user Processes.parent_process Processes.process_name Processes.process Processes.process_id Processes.parent_process_id 
| `drop_dm_object_name(Processes)` 
| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)` 
| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)` 
| `process_execution_via_wmi_filter` 

Macros

The SPL above uses the following Macros:

:information_source: process_execution_via_wmi_filter is a empty macro by default. It allows the user to filter out any results (false positives) without editing the SPL.

Required fields

List of fields required to use this analytic.

  • _time
  • Processes.process
  • Processes.parent_process_name
  • Processes.user
  • Processes.dest
  • Processes.process_name

How To Implement

You must be ingesting endpoint data that tracks process activity, including parent-child relationships from your endpoints to populate the Endpoint data model in the Processes node. The command-line arguments are mapped to the "process" field in the Endpoint data model.

Known False Positives

Although unlikely, administrators may use wmi to execute commands for legitimate purposes.

Associated Analytic Story

RBA

Risk Score Impact Confidence Message
49.0 70 70 A remote instance execution of wmic.exe that will spawn $parent_process_name$ in host $dest$

:information_source: The Risk Score is calculated by the following formula: Risk Score = (Impact * Confidence/100). Initial Confidence and Impact is set by the analytic author.

Reference

Test Dataset

Replay any dataset to Splunk Enterprise by using our replay.py tool or the UI. Alternatively you can replay a dataset into a Splunk Attack Range

source | version: 4