GKE Creation or Modification of Sensitive Role

  1[metadata]
  2creation_date = "2026/07/10"
  3integration = ["gcp"]
  4maturity = "production"
  5updated_date = "2026/07/10"
  6
  7[rule]
  8author = ["Elastic"]
  9description = """
 10Detects creation or modification of GKE Roles or ClusterRoles that grant high-risk permissions, such as wildcard
 11access or RBAC escalation verbs (bind, escalate, impersonate), which may enable privilege escalation or unauthorized
 12access within the cluster.
 13"""
 14false_positives = [
 15    """
 16    Platform installers, GitOps controllers, and RBAC refactoring may legitimately create roles with broad permissions.
 17    Baseline approved automation and tune exclusions for known operators.
 18    """,
 19]
 20from = "now-6m"
 21index = ["logs-gcp.audit-*"]
 22language = "kuery"
 23license = "Elastic License v2"
 24name = "GKE Creation or Modification of Sensitive Role"
 25note = """## Triage and analysis
 26
 27### Investigating GKE Creation or Modification of Sensitive Role
 28
 29This rule detects allowed create, update, or patch actions on Roles and ClusterRoles that introduce high-risk RBAC
 30permissions, including wildcard access and escalation verbs like bind, escalate, or impersonate.
 31
 32### Possible investigation steps
 33
 34- Identify `client.user.email`, `source.ip`, and `user_agent.original`.
 35- Review `gcp.audit.resource_name`, `event.action`, and `gcp.audit.request` for the changed role.
 36- Enumerate RoleBindings or ClusterRoleBindings that reference the role and hunt for follow-on secret or exec activity.
 37
 38### False positive analysis
 39
 40- GitOps or platform bootstrap may create broad roles during onboarding. `system:addon-manager` patch reconciliation on built-in Roles and ClusterRoles is excluded.
 41
 42### Response and remediation
 43
 44- Revert unauthorized roles, remove unexpected bindings, and restrict RBAC change permissions to governed pipelines.
 45
 46"""
 47setup = "The GCP Fleet integration with GKE audit logs enabled is required. Request body capture on RBAC resources is required."
 48references = [
 49    "https://kubernetes.io/docs/reference/access-authn-authz/rbac/",
 50    "https://heilancoos.github.io/research/2025/12/16/kubernetes.html#overly-permissive-role-based-access-control",
 51]
 52risk_score = 47
 53rule_id = "2af7f1d7-d02c-476f-a130-e17ea4e556e6"
 54severity = "medium"
 55tags = [
 56    "Domain: Cloud",
 57    "Domain: Kubernetes",
 58    "Data Source: GCP",
 59    "Data Source: Google Cloud Platform",
 60    "Use Case: Threat Detection",
 61    "Tactic: Persistence",
 62    "Tactic: Privilege Escalation",
 63    "Resources: Investigation Guide",
 64]
 65timestamp_override = "event.ingested"
 66type = "query"
 67
 68query = '''
 69data_stream.dataset:gcp.audit and service.name:"k8s.io" and event.outcome:success and
 70event.action:(
 71  "io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.roles.create" or
 72  "io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.roles.update" or
 73  "io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.roles.patch" or
 74  "io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.clusterroles.create" or
 75  "io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.clusterroles.update" or
 76  "io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.clusterroles.patch"
 77) and not source.ip:("::1" or "127.0.0.1") and not (
 78  client.user.email:"system:serviceaccount:kube-system:clusterrole-aggregation-controller" and
 79  gcp.audit.request.metadata.name:(admin or edit) and
 80  event.action:"io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.clusterroles.patch"
 81) and not (
 82  client.user.email:"system:addon-manager" and
 83  event.action:(
 84    "io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.roles.patch" or
 85    "io.k8s.authorization.rbac.v1.clusterroles.patch"
 86  )
 87) and (
 88  gcp.audit.request.rules.verbs:("*" or escalate or bind or impersonate) or
 89  (
 90    gcp.audit.request.rules.verbs:("*" or create or patch or update) and
 91    gcp.audit.request.rules.resources:(
 92      "*" or clusterroles or clusterrolebindings or roles or rolebindings or
 93      pods/exec or serviceaccounts/token or nodes/proxy or daemonsets
 94    )
 95  ) or
 96  (
 97    gcp.audit.request.rules.verbs:("*" or get or list) and
 98    gcp.audit.request.rules.resources:("*" or secrets)
 99  ) or
100  gcp.audit.response.rules.verbs:("*" or escalate or bind or impersonate) or
101  (
102    gcp.audit.response.rules.verbs:("*" or create or patch or update) and
103    gcp.audit.response.rules.resources:(
104      "*" or clusterroles or clusterrolebindings or roles or rolebindings or
105      pods/exec or serviceaccounts/token or nodes/proxy or daemonsets
106    )
107  ) or
108  (
109    gcp.audit.response.rules.verbs:("*" or get or list) and
110    gcp.audit.response.rules.resources:("*" or secrets)
111  )
112)
113'''
114
115[[rule.threat]]
116framework = "MITRE ATT&CK"
117
118[[rule.threat.technique]]
119id = "T1098"
120name = "Account Manipulation"
121reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1098/"
122
123[[rule.threat.technique.subtechnique]]
124id = "T1098.006"
125name = "Additional Container Cluster Roles"
126reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1098/006/"
127
128[rule.threat.tactic]
129id = "TA0003"
130name = "Persistence"
131reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0003/"
132
133[[rule.threat]]
134framework = "MITRE ATT&CK"
135
136[[rule.threat.technique]]
137id = "T1098"
138name = "Account Manipulation"
139reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1098/"
140
141[[rule.threat.technique.subtechnique]]
142id = "T1098.006"
143name = "Additional Container Cluster Roles"
144reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1098/006/"
145
146[rule.threat.tactic]
147id = "TA0004"
148name = "Privilege Escalation"
149reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0004/"
150
151[rule.investigation_fields]
152field_names = [
153    "@timestamp",
154    "client.user.email",
155    "source.ip",
156    "user_agent.original",
157    "event.action",
158    "event.outcome",
159    "gcp.audit.resource_name",
160    "gcp.audit.request.kind",
161    "data_stream.namespace",
162]