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Description

The following analytic identifies the execution of qwinsta.exe executable in Windows Operating System. This Windows executable file can display information about sessions on a remote desktop session host server. The information includes servername, sessionname, username and many more. This tool is being abused of Qakbot malware to gather information to the targeted or compromised host that will be send back to its Command And Control server.

  • Type: Hunting
  • Product: Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Enterprise Security, Splunk Cloud
  • Datamodel: Endpoint
  • Last Updated: 2022-10-21
  • Author: Teoderick Contreras, Splunk
  • ID: 2e765c1b-144a-49f0-93d0-1df4287cca04

Annotations

ATT&CK

ATT&CK

ID Technique Tactic
T1033 System Owner/User Discovery Discovery
Kill Chain Phase
  • Exploitation
NIST
  • DE.AE
CIS20
  • CIS 10
CVE 


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| tstats `security_content_summariesonly` count min(_time) as firstTime max(_time) as lastTime from datamodel=Endpoint.Processes where Processes.process_name = "qwinsta.exe" OR Processes.original_file_name = "qwinsta.exe" by Processes.parent_process Processes.parent_process_name Processes.process_name Processes.process_id Processes.process_guid Processes.process Processes.user Processes.dest Processes.parent_process_id Processes.original_file_name 
| `drop_dm_object_name("Processes")` 
| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)` 
|`security_content_ctime(lastTime)` 
| `windows_system_discovery_using_qwinsta_filter`

Macros

The SPL above uses the following Macros:

:information_source: windows_system_discovery_using_qwinsta_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.dest
  • Processes.user
  • Processes.parent_process_name
  • Processes.parent_process
  • Processes.original_file_name
  • Processes.process_name
  • Processes.process
  • Processes.process_id
  • Processes.parent_process_path
  • Processes.process_path
  • Processes.parent_process_id

How To Implement

The detection is based on data that originates from Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) agents. These agents are designed to provide security-related telemetry from the endpoints where the agent is installed. To implement this search, you must ingest logs that contain the process GUID, process name, and parent process. Additionally, you must ingest complete command-line executions. These logs must be processed using the appropriate Splunk Technology Add-ons that are specific to the EDR product. The logs must also be mapped to the Processes node of the Endpoint data model. Use the Splunk Common Information Model (CIM) to normalize the field names and speed up the data modeling process.

Known False Positives

Administrator may execute this commandline tool for auditing purposes. Filter as needed.

Associated Analytic Story

RBA

Risk Score Impact Confidence Message
25.0 50 50 System qwinsta domain discovery on $dest$

: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

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