Remote Desktop Process Running On System
THIS IS A EXPERIMENTAL DETECTION
This detection has been marked experimental by the Splunk Threat Research team. This means we have not been able to test, simulate, or build datasets for this detection. Use at your own risk. This analytic is NOT supported.
Description
This search looks for the remote desktop process mstsc.exe running on systems upon which it doesn't typically run. This is accomplished by filtering out all systems that are noted in the common_rdp_source category
in the Assets and Identity framework.
- Type: Hunting
- Product: Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Enterprise Security, Splunk Cloud
- Datamodel: Endpoint
- Last Updated: 2020-07-21
- Author: David Dorsey, Splunk
- ID: f5939373-8054-40ad-8c64-cec478a22a4a
Annotations
ATT&CK
Kill Chain Phase
- Actions on Objectives
NIST
- DE.AE
- PR.AC
- PR.IP
CIS20
- CIS 3
- CIS 9
- CIS 16
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=*mstsc.exe AND Processes.dest_category!=common_rdp_source by Processes.dest Processes.user Processes.process
| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)`
| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)`
| `drop_dm_object_name(Processes)`
| `remote_desktop_process_running_on_system_filter`
Macros
The SPL above uses the following Macros:
remote_desktop_process_running_on_system_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.dest_category
- Processes.dest
- Processes.user
How To Implement
To successfully implement this search, you must be ingesting data that records process activity from your hosts to populate the endpoint data model in the processes node. The search requires you to identify systems that do not commonly use remote desktop. You can use the included support search "Identify Systems Using Remote Desktop" to identify these systems. After identifying them, you will need to add the "common_rdp_source" category to that system using the Enterprise Security Assets and Identities framework. This can be done by adding an entry in the assets.csv file located in SA-IdentityManagement/lookups
.
Known False Positives
Remote Desktop may be used legitimately by users on the network.
Associated Analytic Story
RBA
Risk Score | Impact | Confidence | Message |
---|---|---|---|
25.0 | 50 | 50 | tbd |
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: 5