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Description

The following analytic will detect a suspicious process running in a file path where a process is not commonly seen and is most commonly used by malicious software. This behavior has been used by adversaries where they drop and run an exe in a path that is accessible without admin privileges.

  • Type: TTP
  • Product: Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Enterprise Security, Splunk Cloud
  • Datamodel: Endpoint- Datasource: Splunk Add-on for Sysmon
  • Last Updated: 2021-05-05
  • Author: Teoderick Contreras, Splunk
  • ID: 9be25988-ad82-11eb-a14f-acde48001122

Annotations

ATT&CK
ID Technique Tactic
T1543 Create or Modify System Process Persistence, Privilege Escalation
Kill Chain Phase
  • Exploitation
NIST
CIS20
CVE 
1
2
3
4
5
6

| tstats `security_content_summariesonly` count values(Processes.process_name) as process_name values(Processes.process) as process min(_time) as firstTime max(_time) as lastTime from datamodel=Endpoint.Processes where Processes.process_path = "*\\windows\\fonts\\*" OR Processes.process_path = "*\\windows\\temp\\*" OR Processes.process_path = "*\\users\\public\\*" OR Processes.process_path = "*\\windows\\debug\\*" OR Processes.process_path.file_path = "*\\Users\\Administrator\\Music\\*" OR Processes.process_path.file_path = "*\\Windows\\servicing\\*" OR Processes.process_path.file_path = "*\\Users\\Default\\*" OR Processes.process_path.file_path = "*Recycle.bin*" OR Processes.process_path = "*\\Windows\\Media\\*" OR Processes.process_path = "\\Windows\\repair\\*" OR Processes.process_path = "*\\temp\\*" OR Processes.process_path = "*\\PerfLogs\\*" by Processes.parent_process_name Processes.parent_process Processes.process_path Processes.dest Processes.user 
| `drop_dm_object_name(Processes)` 
| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)` 
| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)` 
| `suspicious_process_file_path_filter`

Macros

The SPL above uses the following Macros:

Note that suspicious_process_file_path_filter is a empty macro by default. It allows the user to filter out any results (false positives) without editing the SPL.

Required field

  • _time
  • Processes.process_name
  • Processes.process
  • Processes.parent_process_name
  • Processes.parent_process
  • Processes.process_path
  • Processes.dest
  • Processes.user

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

Administrators may allow execution of specific binaries in non-standard paths. Filter as needed.

Associated Analytic story

RBA

Risk Score Impact Confidence Message
35.0 70 50 Suspicioues process $Processes.process_path.file_path$ running from suspicious location

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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