Account Discovery Command via SYSTEM Account

Identifies when the SYSTEM account uses an account discovery utility. This could be a sign of discovery activity after an adversary has achieved privilege escalation.

Rule type: eql

Rule indices:

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

Severity: low

Risk score: 21

Runs every: 5m

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

Maximum alerts per execution: 100

References: None

Tags:

Elastic
Host
Windows
Threat Detection
Discovery

Version: 11

Rule authors:

Elastic

Rule license: Elastic License v2

Investigation guide

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## Config

If enabling an EQL rule on a non-elastic-agent index (such as beats) for versions <8.2, events will not define `event.ingested` and default fallback for EQL rules was not added until 8.2, so you will need to add a custom pipeline to populate `event.ingested` to @timestamp for this rule to work.

Rule query

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process where event.type in ("start", "process_started") and
  (?process.Ext.token.integrity_level_name : "System" or
  ?winlog.event_data.IntegrityLevel : "System") and
  (process.name : "whoami.exe" or
  (process.name : "net1.exe" and not process.parent.name : "net.exe"))

Framework: MITRE ATT&CK^TM

Tactic:
- Name: Discovery
- ID: TA0007
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0007/
Technique:
- Name: System Owner/User Discovery
- ID: T1033
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1033/

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