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Description

The following analytic identifies a process execution of Windows OS cmdkey.exe tool. This tool is being abused or used by several post exploitation tool such as winpeas that being used by ransomware prestige to list stored user names, passwords or credentials in the targeted Windows OS host. This information can be used by the attacker to gain privilege escalation and persistence in the targeted hosts for further attacks.

  • Type: Anomaly
  • Product: Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Enterprise Security, Splunk Cloud
  • Datamodel: Endpoint
  • Last Updated: 2022-11-30
  • Author: Teoderick Contreras, Splunk
  • ID: db02d6b4-5d5b-4c33-8d8f-f0577516a8c7

Annotations

ATT&CK

ATT&CK

ID Technique Tactic
T1555 Credentials from Password Stores Credential Access
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="cmdkey.exe" OR Processes.original_file_name = "cmdkey.exe" AND Processes.process = "*/list*" by Processes.process_name Processes.original_file_name Processes.process Processes.process_id Processes.process_guid Processes.parent_process_name Processes.parent_process Processes.parent_process_guid Processes.dest Processes.user 
| `drop_dm_object_name(Processes)` 
| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)` 
| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)` 
| `windows_credentials_from_password_stores_query_filter`

Macros

The SPL above uses the following Macros:

:information_source: windows_credentials_from_password_stores_query_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
  • Processes.parent_process_guid
  • Processes.process_guid

How To Implement

To successfully implement this search, you need to be ingesting logs with the process name, parent process, and command-line executions from your endpoints. If you are using Sysmon, you must have at least version 6.0.4 of the Sysmon TA. Tune and filter known instances of wermgr.exe may be used.

Known False Positives

network administrator can use this tool for auditing process.

Associated Analytic Story

RBA

Risk Score Impact Confidence Message
25.0 50 50 a process $process_name$ was executed in $dest$ to display stored username and credentials.

: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: 1