Excel Spawning PowerShell
Description
The following detection identifies Microsoft Excel spawning PowerShell. Typically, this is not common behavior and not default with Excel.exe. Excel.exe will generally be found in the following path C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\Office16
(version will vary). PowerShell spawning from Excel.exe is common for a spearphishing attachment and is actively used. Albeit, the command executed will most likely be encoded and captured via another detection. During triage, review parallel processes and identify any files that may have been written.
- Type: TTP
- Product: Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Enterprise Security, Splunk Cloud
- Datamodel: Endpoint
- Last Updated: 2021-04-12
- Author: Michael Haag, Splunk
- ID: 42d40a22-9be3-11eb-8f08-acde48001122
Annotations
ATT&CK
Kill Chain Phase
- Exploitation
NIST
- DE.CM
CIS20
- CIS 10
CVE
Search
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| tstats `security_content_summariesonly` count values(Processes.process) min(_time) as firstTime max(_time) as lastTime from datamodel=Endpoint.Processes where Processes.parent_process_name="excel.exe" `process_powershell` by Processes.parent_process Processes.process_name Processes.user Processes.dest Processes.original_file_name
| `drop_dm_object_name("Processes")`
| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)`
|`security_content_ctime(lastTime)`
| `excel_spawning_powershell_filter`
Macros
The SPL above uses the following Macros:
excel_spawning_powershell_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.
- 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. In addition, confirm the latest CIM App 4.20 or higher is installed and the latest TA for the endpoint product.
Known False Positives
False positives should be limited, but if any are present, filter as needed.
Associated Analytic Story
RBA
Risk Score | Impact | Confidence | Message |
---|---|---|---|
80.0 | 80 | 100 | An instance of $parent_process_name$ spawning $process_name$ was identified on endpoint $dest$ by user $user$, indicating potential suspicious macro execution. |
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://redcanary.com/threat-detection-report/techniques/powershell/
- https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1566/001/
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: 1