This documentation contains work-in-progress information for future Elastic Stack and Cloud releases. Use the version selector to view supported release docs. It also contains some Elastic Cloud serverless information. Check out our serverless docs for more details.

« Suspicious WMIC XSL Script Execution Enumerating Domain Trusts via NLTEST.EXE »

› ›

Unusual File Creation - Alternate Data Stream

edit

Unusual File Creation - Alternate Data Stream

edit

Identifies suspicious creation of Alternate Data Streams on highly targeted files. This is uncommon for legitimate files and sometimes done by adversaries to hide malware.

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: None

Tags:

Elastic
Host
Windows
Threat Detection
Defense Evasion

Version: 100

Rule authors:

Elastic

Rule license: Elastic License v2

Investigation guide

edit

Rule query

edit

file where event.type == "creation" and

  file.path : "C:\\*:*" and
  not file.path : "C:\\*:zone.identifier*" and

  not process.executable :
          ("?:\\windows\\System32\\svchost.exe",
           "?:\\Windows\\System32\\inetsrv\\w3wp.exe",
           "?:\\Windows\\explorer.exe",
           "?:\\Windows\\System32\\sihost.exe",
           "?:\\Windows\\System32\\PickerHost.exe",
           "?:\\Windows\\System32\\SearchProtocolHost.exe",
           "?:\\Program Files (x86)\\Dropbox\\Client\\Dropbox.exe",
           "?:\\Program Files\\Rivet Networks\\SmartByte\\SmartByteNetworkService.exe",
           "?:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft\\Edge\\Application\\msedge.exe",
           "?:\\Program Files\\ExpressConnect\\ExpressConnectNetworkService.exe",
           "?:\\Program Files (x86)\\Google\\Chrome\\Application\\chrome.exe",
           "?:\\Program Files\\Google\\Chrome\\Application\\chrome.exe",
           "?:\\Program Files\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe") and

  file.extension :
    (
      "pdf",
      "dll",
      "png",
      "exe",
      "dat",
      "com",
      "bat",
      "cmd",
      "sys",
      "vbs",
      "ps1",
      "hta",
      "txt",
      "vbe",
      "js",
      "wsh",
      "docx",
      "doc",
      "xlsx",
      "xls",
      "pptx",
      "ppt",
      "rtf",
      "gif",
      "jpg",
      "png",
      "bmp",
      "img",
      "iso"
    )

Framework: MITRE ATT&CK^TM

Tactic:
- Name: Defense Evasion
- ID: TA0005
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0005/
Technique:
- Name: Hide Artifacts
- ID: T1564
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1564/
Sub-technique:
- Name: NTFS File Attributes
- ID: T1564.004
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1564/004/

« Suspicious WMIC XSL Script Execution Enumerating Domain Trusts via NLTEST.EXE »