Sigma rule: Suspicious Plink Port Forwarding

Rule

Title

Suspicious Plink Port Forwarding

Status

test

Level

high

Author

Florian Roth (Nextron Systems)

Date

2021-01-19

Modified

2022-10-09

File

rules/windows/process_creation/proc_creation_win_plink_port_forwarding.yml

Commit

ccbb0369507f796db0b0ae6854c8a2be471b9d84

Detects suspicious Plink tunnel port forwarding to a local port

Log source

product

windows

category

process_creation

Detection

selection:
    Description: 'Command-line SSH, Telnet, and Rlogin client'
    CommandLine|contains: ' -R '
condition: selection

False positives (as the rule lists them)

• Administrative activity using a remote port forwarding to a local port

Tags

• attack.command-and-control
• attack.t1572
• attack.lateral-movement
• attack.t1021.001

MITRE ATT&CK ids this rule names

• T1021.001
• T1572

References

• https://www.real-sec.com/2019/04/bypassing-network-restrictions-through-rdp-tunneling/
• https://medium.com/@informationsecurity/remote-ssh-tunneling-with-plink-exe-7831072b3d7d

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