Detection: Windows Error Report Created in ReportQueue Manually

Updated Date: 2026-08-18 ID: c3b33d42-dd28-41bc-8abd-407654a5c9bc Author: Onur Mustafa Erdogan, Splunk Type: Anomaly Product: Splunk Enterprise Security

Description

The following analytic detects a .wer file being written into the Windows Error Reporting ReportQueue directory by a process other than the standard error-reporting binaries. Windows Error Reporting normally populates ReportQueue only through werfault.exe, werfaultsecure.exe, or wermgr.exe following an actual application crash. In the ShieldBreak exploit, the attacker fabricates a .wer report directly and manually invokes the QueueReporting scheduled task, which causes wermgr.exe to process the report and load an attacker-planted phantom DLL at SYSTEM integrity. If confirmed malicious, this activity indicates preparation for a local privilege escalation attempt abusing Windows Error Reporting.

Search

 1`sysmon`
 2EventCode=11
 3action IN ("created","modified")
 4file_name="*.wer"
 5file_path="*\\ReportQueue\\*"
 6NOT process_path IN (
 7  "*\\svchost.exe",
 8  "*\\werfault.exe",
 9  "*\\werfaultsecure.exe",
10  "*\\wermgr.exe"
11)
12
13| fillnull
14
15| stats count min(_time) as firstTime
16              max(_time) as lastTime
17  by dest file_name file_path file_hash action
18     process_name process_path process_id user vendor_product
19
20| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)`
21
22| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)`
23
24| `windows_error_report_created_in_reportqueue_manually_filter`

Data Source

Name	Platform	Sourcetype	Source
Sysmon EventID 11	Windows	`'XmlWinEventLog'`	`'XmlWinEventLog:Microsoft-Windows-Sysmon/Operational'`

Macros Used

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

windows_error_report_created_in_reportqueue_manually_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
T1053.005	Scheduled Task	Execution
T1068	Exploitation for Privilege Escalation	Persistence

Exploitation

Installation

DE.AE

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)	No
Creates Intermediate Finding (Risk Event)	Yes

Anomaly detections generate Intermediate Findings (Risk Events). They do not generate a Finding (Notable) directly.

Implementation

To successfully implement this search, you need to be ingesting logs with file creation events from your endpoints. If you are using Sysmon, you must have EventID 11 (FileCreate) enabled, and the FileCreate section of the configuration must include TargetFilename paths ending in .wer or containing ReportQueue, since these are commonly excluded by default configurations.

Known False Positives

Crash-reporting or telemetry agents that integrate with Windows Error Reporting may stage .wer files outside the standard WER binaries. Tune by Image as necessary for your environment.

Associated Analytic Story

Intermediate Findings

Message	Entity Field	Entity Type	Risk Score
A suspicious process [$process_name$] created a Windows Error Reporting report [$file_path$] on [$dest$]	dest	system	40

Threat Objects

Field	Type
process_name	process_name
file_path	file_path

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: 1