Cobalt Strike is a threat emulation platform commonly modified and used by adversaries to conduct network attack and exploitation campaigns. This rule detects a network activity algorithm leveraged by Cobalt Strike implant beacons for command and control.

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Detects a Roshal Archive (RAR) file or PowerShell script downloaded from the internet by an internal host. Gaining initial access to a system and then downloading encoded or encrypted tools to move laterally is a common practice for adversaries as a way to protect their more valuable tools and tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). This may be atypical behavior for a managed network and can be indicative of malware, exfiltration, or command and control.

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This rule detects the first observed successful login of a user with the Administrator role to the FortiGate management interface within the last 5 days. First-time administrator logins can indicate newly provisioned accounts, misconfigurations, or unauthorized access using valid credentials and should be reviewed promptly.

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This rule detects the first successful FortiCloud SSO login from a previously unseen source IP address to a FortiGate device within the last 5 days. FortiCloud SSO logins from new source IPs may indicate exploitation of SAML-based authentication bypass vulnerabilities such as CVE-2026-24858, where crafted SAML assertions allow unauthorized access to FortiGate devices registered to other accounts. Environments that regularly use FortiCloud SSO will only alert on new source IPs not seen in the lookback window.

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Identifies DNS query patterns associated with tunneling, including rare NULL queries, repeated TXT queries with unusually long names, and clients generating many unique, long subdomains under one registered domain within a five-minute window.

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This rule detects network events that may indicate the use of Telnet traffic. Telnet is commonly used by system administrators to remotely control older or embedded systems using the command line shell. It should almost never be directly exposed to the Internet, as it is frequently targeted and exploited by threat actors as an initial access or backdoor vector. As a plain-text protocol, it may also expose usernames and passwords to anyone capable of observing the traffic.

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This rule detects network events that may indicate the use of RPC traffic from the Internet. RPC is commonly used by system administrators to remotely control a system for maintenance or to use shared resources. It should almost never be directly exposed to the Internet, as it is frequently targeted and exploited by threat actors as an initial access or backdoor vector.

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This rule detects network events that may indicate the use of RPC traffic to the Internet. RPC is commonly used by system administrators to remotely control a system for maintenance or to use shared resources. It should almost never be directly exposed to the Internet, as it is frequently targeted and exploited by threat actors as an initial access or backdoor vector.

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This rule detects network events that may indicate inbound Windows file sharing (SMB or CIFS) traffic originating from the Internet. SMB should never be directly reachable from the Internet, as it is a primary target for exploitation by threat actors seeking initial access. Inbound SMB from a public IP is a direct precondition for attacks such as EternalBlue (MS17-010) and related SMB remote code execution vulnerabilities.

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This rule detects network events that may indicate the use of Windows file sharing (also called SMB or CIFS) traffic to the Internet. SMB is commonly used within networks to share files, printers, and other system resources amongst trusted systems. It should almost never be directly exposed to the Internet, as it is frequently targeted and exploited by threat actors as an initial access or backdoor vector or for data exfiltration.

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This rule correlate any Elastic Defend alert with a set of suspicious events from Network security devices like Palo Alto Networks (PANW), Fortinet Fortigate and Suricata by host.ip and source.ip. This may indicate that this host is compromised and triggering multi-datasource alerts.

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This rule detects FortiGate administrator account creation from a source IP address not previously seen performing admin operations on the device. Threat actors exploiting CVE-2026-24858 (FG-IR-26-060) authenticate via FortiCloud SSO bypass and immediately create local administrator accounts for persistence, typically from infrastructure not associated with normal administrative activity.

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This rule detects successful logins to the FortiGate management interface using the same Administrator account from multiple distinct source IP addresses within an 24-hour period. Administrator logins from multiple locations in a short time window may indicate credential sharing, compromised credentials, or unauthorized access and should be investigated.

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This rule detects the download of a FortiGate device configuration file. Configuration exports contain sensitive data including administrator password hashes, LDAP bind credentials, VPN pre-shared keys, routing tables, and firewall policies. Threat actors exploiting CVE-2026-24858 have been observed exporting the full device configuration immediately after gaining access to harvest credentials and map the internal network.

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This rule detects the creation or modification of a FortiGate firewall policy that permits all sources, all destinations, and all services. An overly permissive policy effectively bypasses all firewall protections. Threat actors exploiting CVE-2026-24858 have been observed creating such policies to allow unrestricted traffic flow through compromised FortiGate devices.

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This detection correlates FortiGate's application control SOCKS events with Elastic Defend network event to identify the source process performing SOCKS traffic. Adversaries may use a connection proxy to direct network traffic between systems or act as an intermediary for network communications to a command and control server to avoid direct connections to their infrastructure.

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Detects when a FortiGate SSL VPN login event is followed by any SIEM detection alert for the same user name within a short time window. This correlation can indicate abuse of VPN access for malicious activity, credential compromise used from a VPN session, or initial access via VPN followed by post-compromise behavior.

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This rule detects a FortiCloud SSO login followed by administrator account creation on the same FortiGate device within 15 minutes. This sequence is a high-confidence indicator of the FG-IR-26-060 attack pattern, where threat actors authenticate via SAML-based SSO bypass and immediately create local administrator accounts for persistence.

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This rule detects the creation of an administrator account on a FortiGate device. Administrator account creation on these devices should be infrequent and tightly controlled. In the FG-IR-26-060 campaign, threat actors created super_admin accounts immediately after gaining initial access via FortiCloud SSO bypass to establish persistence.

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This rule detects FortiGate alerts that are observed for the first time in the previous 5 days of alert history. Analysts can use this to prioritize triage and response.

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This rule identifies network security alerts related to CVE-2025-55182 exploitation attempts from different network security integrations. CVE-2025-55182 is a critical remote code execution vulnerability in React Server Components (RSC) Flight protocol. The vulnerability allows attackers to execute arbitrary code on the server by sending specially crafted deserialization payloads that exploit prototype chain traversal to access the Function constructor.

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This rule detects events that may indicate use of SMTP on TCP port 26 from an internal host to an external destination. This port is commonly used by several popular mail transfer agents to deconflict with the default SMTP port 25. This port has also been used by a malware family called BadPatch for command and control of Windows systems. The rule is scoped to outbound traffic (internal source to external destination) to focus on the command and control and exfiltration use cases, rather than benign internal mail relays or unrelated transit traffic observed by the sensor.

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This rule detects network events that may indicate the use of VNC traffic from the Internet. VNC is commonly used by system administrators to remotely control a system for maintenance or to use shared resources. It should almost never be directly exposed to the Internet, as it is frequently targeted and exploited by threat actors as an initial access or backdoor vector.

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This rule detects network events that may indicate the use of VNC traffic to the Internet. VNC is commonly used by system administrators to remotely control a system for maintenance or to use shared resources. It should almost never be directly exposed to the Internet, as it is frequently targeted and exploited by threat actors as an initial access or backdoor vector.

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