UAC Bypass Attempt via Elevated COM Internet Explorer Add-On Installer

Identifies User Account Control (UAC) bypass attempts by abusing an elevated COM Interface to launch a malicious program. Attackers may attempt to bypass UAC to stealthily execute code with elevated permissions.

Elastic rule (View on GitHub)

 1[metadata]
 2creation_date = "2020/11/03"
 3integration = ["endpoint", "windows"]
 4maturity = "production"
 5min_stack_comments = "New fields added: required_fields, related_integrations, setup"
 6min_stack_version = "8.3.0"
 7updated_date = "2023/06/22"
 8
 9[rule]
10author = ["Elastic"]
11description = """
12Identifies User Account Control (UAC) bypass attempts by abusing an elevated COM Interface to launch a malicious
13program. Attackers may attempt to bypass UAC to stealthily execute code with elevated permissions.
14"""
15from = "now-9m"
16index = ["winlogbeat-*", "logs-endpoint.events.*", "logs-windows.*", "endgame-*"]
17language = "eql"
18license = "Elastic License v2"
19name = "UAC Bypass Attempt via Elevated COM Internet Explorer Add-On Installer"
20note = """## Setup
21
22If 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.
23"""
24references = ["https://swapcontext.blogspot.com/2020/11/uac-bypasses-from-comautoapprovallist.html"]
25risk_score = 47
26rule_id = "fc7c0fa4-8f03-4b3e-8336-c5feab0be022"
27severity = "medium"
28tags = ["Domain: Endpoint", "OS: Windows", "Use Case: Threat Detection", "Tactic: Privilege Escalation", "Data Source: Elastic Endgame", "Data Source: Elastic Defend"]
29timestamp_override = "event.ingested"
30type = "eql"
31
32query = '''
33process where host.os.type == "windows" and event.type == "start" and
34 process.executable : "C:\\*\\AppData\\*\\Temp\\IDC*.tmp\\*.exe" and
35 process.parent.name : "ieinstal.exe" and process.parent.args : "-Embedding"
36
37 /* uncomment once in winlogbeat */
38 /* and not (process.code_signature.subject_name == "Microsoft Corporation" and process.code_signature.trusted == true) */
39'''
40
41
42[[rule.threat]]
43framework = "MITRE ATT&CK"
44[[rule.threat.technique]]
45id = "T1548"
46name = "Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism"
47reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1548/"
48[[rule.threat.technique.subtechnique]]
49id = "T1548.002"
50name = "Bypass User Account Control"
51reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1548/002/"
52
53
54
55[rule.threat.tactic]
56id = "TA0004"
57name = "Privilege Escalation"
58reference = "https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0004/"

Setup

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.

References

Related rules

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