Certutil exe certificate extraction
Description
This search looks for arguments to certutil.exe indicating the manipulation or extraction of Certificate. This certificate can then be used to sign new authentication tokens specially inside Federated environments such as Windows ADFS.
- Type: TTP
- Product: Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Enterprise Security, Splunk Cloud
- Datamodel: Endpoint
- Last Updated: 2022-07-15
- Author: Rod Soto, Splunk
- ID: 337a46be-600f-11eb-ae93-0242ac130002
Annotations
ATT&CK
Kill Chain Phase
NIST
- DE.CM
CIS20
- CIS 10
CVE
Search
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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=certutil.exe Processes.process = "*-exportPFX*" 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)`
| `certutil_exe_certificate_extraction_filter`
Macros
The SPL above uses the following Macros:
certutil_exe_certificate_extraction_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
To successfully implement this search you need to be ingesting information on process that include the name of the process responsible for the changes from your endpoints into the Endpoint
datamodel in the Processes
node.
Known False Positives
Unless there are specific use cases, manipulating or exporting certificates using certutil is uncommon. Extraction of certificate has been observed during attacks such as Golden SAML and other campaigns targeting Federated services.
Associated Analytic Story
- Windows Persistence Techniques
- Cloud Federated Credential Abuse
- Living Off The Land
- Windows Certificate Services
RBA
Risk Score | Impact | Confidence | Message |
---|---|---|---|
63.0 | 90 | 70 | An instance of $parent_process_name$ spawning $process_name$ was identified on endpoint $dest$ by user $user$ attempting export a certificate. |
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
- https://blog.sygnia.co/detection-and-hunting-of-golden-saml-attack
- https://strontic.github.io/xcyclopedia/library/certutil.exe-09A8A29BAA3A451713FD3D07943B4A43.html
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: 2