Sigma rule: Reconnaissance Activity Using BuiltIn Commands

Rule

Title

Reconnaissance Activity Using BuiltIn Commands

Status

unsupported

Level

medium

Author

Florian Roth (Nextron Systems), Markus Neis

Date

2018/08/22

Modified

2023/02/24

File

unsupported/windows/proc_creation_win_correlation_susp_builtin_commands_recon.yml

Commit

ccbb0369507f796db0b0ae6854c8a2be471b9d84

Detects execution of a set of builtin commands often used in recon stages by different attack groups

Log source

product

windows

category

process_creation

Detection

selection:
    - CommandLine:
        - tasklist
        - net time
        - systeminfo
        - whoami
        - nbtstat
        - net start
        - qprocess
        - nslookup
        - hostname.exe
        - 'netstat -an'
    - CommandLine|endswith:
        - '\net1 start'
        - '\net1 user /domain'
        - '\net1 group /domain'
        - '\net1 group "domain admins" /domain'
        - '\net1 group "Exchange Trusted Subsystem" /domain'
        - '\net1 accounts /domain'
        - '\net1 user net localgroup administrators'
timeframe: 15s
condition: selection | count() by CommandLine > 4

False positives (as the rule lists them)

• False positives depend on scripts and administrative tools used in the monitored environment

Tags

• attack.discovery
• attack.t1087
• attack.t1082
• car.2016-03-001

MITRE ATT&CK ids this rule names

• T1082
• T1087

References

• https://twitter.com/haroonmeer/status/939099379834658817
• https://twitter.com/c_APT_ure/status/939475433711722497
• https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2016/05/targeted_attacksaga.html

Read on 2026-11-03T00:58:21.399Z under licence sigma-drl-1.1@d5f4c36a from https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ccbb0369507f796db0b0ae6854c8a2be471b9d84/unsupported/windows/proc_creation_win_correlation_susp_builtin_commands_recon.yml