| ID | Technique | Tactic |
|---|---|---|
| T1098.001 | Additional Cloud Credentials | Persistence |
Detection: O365 Service Principal New Client Credentials
Description
The following analytic detects the addition of new credentials for Service Principals within an Office 365 tenant. It uses O365 audit logs, focusing on events related to credential modifications or additions in the AzureActiveDirectory workload. This activity is significant because Service Principals represent application identities, and their credentials allow applications to authenticate and access resources. If an attacker successfully adds or modifies these credentials, they can impersonate the application, leading to unauthorized data access, data exfiltration, or malicious operations under the application's identity.
Search
1`o365_management_activity` Workload=AzureActiveDirectory Operation="Update application*Certificates and secrets management "
2
3| fillnull
4
5| stats earliest(_time) as firstTime latest(_time) as lastTime
6 BY user ModifiedProperties{}.NewValue object
7 ObjectId dest signature
8 src vendor_account vendor_product
9
10| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)`
11
12| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)`
13
14| `o365_service_principal_new_client_credentials_filter`
Data Source
| Name | Platform | Sourcetype | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| O365 | Other | 'o365:management:activity' |
'o365' |
Macros Used
| Name | Value |
|---|---|
| security_content_ctime | convert timeformat="%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S" ctime($field$) |
| o365_service_principal_new_client_credentials_filter | search * |
o365_service_principal_new_client_credentials_filter is an empty macro by default. It allows the user to filter out any results (false positives) without editing the SPL.
Annotations
MITRE ATT&CK
Kill Chain Phases
NIST
CIS
Threat Actors
Exploitation
Installation
DE.CM
CIS 10
Default Configuration
This detection is configured by default in Splunk Enterprise Security to run with the following settings:
| Setting | Value |
|---|---|
| Disabled | true |
| Cron Schedule | 0 * * * * |
| Earliest Time | -70m@m |
| Latest Time | -10m@m |
| Schedule Window | auto |
| Creates Finding (Notable) | Yes |
| Rule Title | %name% |
| Rule Description | %description% |
| Notable Event Fields | user, dest |
| Creates Intermediate Finding (Risk Event) | Yes |
TTP detections generate a Finding (Notable) and may generate Intermediate Findings (Risk Events) for associated entities.
Implementation
You must install the Splunk Microsoft Office 365 Add-on and ingest Office 365 management activity events.
Known False Positives
Service Principal client credential modifications may be part of legitimate administrative operations. Filter as needed.
Associated Analytic Story
Finding
| Title | Entity Field | Entity Type | Risk Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| New credentials added for Service Principal $object$ | object | user | 50 |
Intermediate Findings
| Message | Entity Field | Entity Type | Risk Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| New credentials added for Service Principal $object$ | user | user | 50 |
References
Detection Testing
| Test Type | Status | Dataset | Source | Sourcetype |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Validation | ✅ Passing | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Unit | ✅ Passing | Dataset | o365 |
o365:management:activity |
| Integration | ✅ Passing | Dataset | o365 |
o365:management:activity |
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: GitHub | Version: 13