Detection: Winword Spawning Windows Script Host

REMOVED DETECTION

This detection has been removed from the Splunk Threat Research content library and is no longer maintained or supported.

Reason: The following analytics was deprecated in favour of a more generic approach. Where instead of creating specific analytic for every potentially suspicious child of an office product. We group them by threat level. This would ease management and false positives tuning.

Removed in version: 5.2.0

Replacement: Windows Office Product Spawned Uncommon Process

If you have any questions or concerns, please reach out to us at research@splunk.com.

Updated Date: 2026-05-13 ID: 637e1b5c-9be1-11eb-9c32-acde48001122 Author: Michael Haag, Splunk Type: TTP Product: Splunk Enterprise Security

Description

The following analytic has been deprecated in favour of a more generic approach. The following analytic identifies instances where Microsoft Winword.exe spawns Windows Script Host processes (cscript.exe or wscript.exe). This behavior is detected using Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) telemetry, focusing on process creation events where the parent process is Winword.exe. This activity is significant because it is uncommon and often associated with spearphishing attacks, where malicious scripts are executed via document macros. If confirmed malicious, this could lead to code execution, allowing attackers to gain initial access, execute further payloads, or establish persistence within the environment.

Search

1
2| tstats `security_content_summariesonly` count min(_time) as firstTime max(_time) as lastTime from datamodel=Endpoint.Processes where Processes.parent_process_name="winword.exe" Processes.process_name IN ("cscript.exe", "wscript.exe") by Processes.dest Processes.user Processes.parent_process Processes.process_name Processes.process Processes.process_id Processes.parent_process_id 
3| `drop_dm_object_name(Processes)` 
4| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)` 
5| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)` 
6| `winword_spawning_windows_script_host_filter`

Data Source

Name	Platform	Sourcetype	Source
Sysmon EventID 1	Windows	`'XmlWinEventLog'`	`'XmlWinEventLog:Microsoft-Windows-Sysmon/Operational'`
Windows Event Log Security 4688	Windows	`'XmlWinEventLog'`	`'XmlWinEventLog:Security'`
CrowdStrike ProcessRollup2	Other	`'crowdstrike:events:sensor'`	`'crowdstrike'`

Macros Used

Name	Value
security_content_summariesonly	`summariesonly=`summariesonly_config `allow_old_summaries=`oldsummaries_config `fillnull_value=`fillnull_config``
winword_spawning_windows_script_host_filter	``

winword_spawning_windows_script_host_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
T1566.001	Spearphishing Attachment	Initial Access

Default Configuration

This detection is configured by default in Splunk Enterprise Security to run with the following settings:

Setting	Value
Disabled	true
Cron Schedule	`N/A`
Earliest Time	`N/A`
Latest Time	`N/A`
Schedule Window	`N/A`
Creates Finding (Notable)	No
Creates Intermediate Finding (Risk Event)	No

TTP detections generate a Finding (Notable) and may generate Intermediate Findings (Risk Events) for associated entities.

Implementation

The detection is based on data that originates from Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) agents. These agents are designed to provide security-related telemetry from the endpoints where the agent is installed. To implement this search, you must ingest logs that contain the process GUID, process name, and parent process. Additionally, you must ingest complete command-line executions. These logs must be processed using the appropriate Splunk Technology Add-ons that are specific to the EDR product. The logs must also be mapped to the Processes node of the Endpoint data model. Use the Splunk Common Information Model (CIM) to normalize the field names and speed up the data modeling process.

Known False Positives

There will be limited false positives and it will be different for every environment. Tune by child process or command-line as needed.

Associated Analytic Story

References

https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1566/001/

Detection Testing

Test Type	Status	Dataset	Source	Sourcetype
Validation	Not Applicable	N/A	N/A	N/A
Unit	Not Applicable	N/A	`N/A`	`N/A`
Integration	Not Applicable	N/A	`N/A`	`N/A`

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: 7