Network Connection via Mshta

Identifies mshta.exe making a network connection. This may indicate adversarial activity, as mshta.exe is often leveraged by adversaries to execute malicious scripts and evade detection.

Rule type: eql

Rule indices:

winlogbeat-*
logs-endpoint.events.*
logs-windows.*

Severity: medium

Risk score: 47

Runs every: 5m

Searches indices from: now-9m (Date Math format, see also Additional look-back time)

Maximum alerts per execution: 100

References:

https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html

Tags:

Elastic
Host
Windows
Threat Detection
Defense Evasion

Version: 5

Rule authors:

Elastic

Rule license: Elastic License v2

Rule query

edit

/* duplicate of Mshta Making Network Connections - c2d90150-0133-451c-a783-533e736c12d7 */

sequence by process.entity_id
  [process where process.name : "mshta.exe" and event.type == "start"]
  [network where process.name : "mshta.exe"]

Framework: MITRE ATT&CK^TM

Tactic:
- Name: Defense Evasion
- ID: TA0005
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0005/
Technique:
- Name: Signed Binary Proxy Execution
- ID: T1218
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1218/
Sub-technique:
- Name: Mshta
- ID: T1218.005
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1218/005/

« Webshell Detection: Script Process Child of Common Web Processes Appendix G: Downloadable rule update v0.16.1 »