Detection: Windows Hunting System Account Targeting Lsass

Updated Date: 2024-08-14 ID: 1c6abb08-73d1-11ec-9ca0-acde48001122 Author: Michael Haag, Splunk Type: Hunting Product: Splunk Enterprise Security

Description

The following analytic identifies processes attempting to access Lsass.exe, which may indicate credential dumping or applications needing credential access. It leverages Sysmon EventCode 10 to detect such activities by analyzing fields like TargetImage, GrantedAccess, and SourceImage. This behavior is significant as unauthorized access to Lsass.exe can lead to credential theft, posing a severe security risk. If confirmed malicious, attackers could gain access to sensitive credentials, potentially leading to privilege escalation and further compromise of the environment.

Search

1`sysmon` EventCode=10 TargetImage=*lsass.exe 
2| stats count min(_time) as firstTime max(_time) as lastTime by dest, TargetImage, GrantedAccess, SourceImage, SourceProcessId, SourceUser, TargetUser  
3| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)` 
4| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)` 
5| `windows_hunting_system_account_targeting_lsass_filter`

Data Source

Name	Platform	Sourcetype	Source	Supported App
Sysmon EventID 10	Windows	`'xmlwineventlog'`	`'XmlWinEventLog:Microsoft-Windows-Sysmon/Operational'`	N/A

Macros Used

Name	Value
security_content_ctime	`convert timeformat="%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S" ctime($field$)`
windows_hunting_system_account_targeting_lsass_filter	`search *`

windows_hunting_system_account_targeting_lsass_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

ID	Technique	Tactic
T1003.001	LSASS Memory	Credential Access
T1003	OS Credential Dumping	Credential Access

KillChainPhase.EXPLOITAITON

NistCategory.DE_AE

Cis18Value.CIS_10

APT1

APT28

APT3

APT32

APT33

APT39

APT41

APT5

Aquatic Panda

BRONZE BUTLER

Blue Mockingbird

Cleaver

Earth Lusca

FIN13

FIN6

FIN8

Fox Kitten

GALLIUM

HAFNIUM

Indrik Spider

Ke3chang

Kimsuky

Leafminer

Leviathan

Magic Hound

MuddyWater

OilRig

PLATINUM

Sandworm Team

Silence

Threat Group-3390

Volt Typhoon

Whitefly

Wizard Spider

APT28

APT32

APT39

Axiom

Leviathan

Poseidon Group

Sowbug

Suckfly

Tonto Team

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 Risk Event	False

This configuration file applies to all detections of type hunting.

Implementation

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. Enabling EventCode 10 TargetProcess lsass.exe is required.

Known False Positives

False positives will occur based on GrantedAccess and SourceUser, filter based on source image as needed. Utilize this hunting analytic to tune out false positives in TTP or anomaly analytics.

Associated Analytic Story

Risk Based Analytics (RBA)

Risk Message	Risk Score	Impact	Confidence
A process, $SourceImage$, has requested access to LSASS on $dest$. Review for further details.	64	80	80

The Risk Score is calculated by the following formula: Risk Score = (Impact * Confidence/100). Initial Confidence and Impact is set by the analytic author.

References

Detection Testing

Test Type	Status	Dataset	Source	Sourcetype
Validation	✅ Passing	N/A	N/A	N/A
Unit	✅ Passing	Dataset	`XmlWinEventLog:Microsoft-Windows-Sysmon/Operational`	`xmlwineventlog`
Integration	✅ Passing	Dataset	`XmlWinEventLog:Microsoft-Windows-Sysmon/Operational`	`xmlwineventlog`

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: 3