Sigma rule: Winlogon Notify Key Logon Persistence

A detection rule from the SigmaHQ repository, shown as its author published it. Dataset version ref-75e45792e534, updated 2023-08-17T00:00:00.000Z.

Rule

Title: Winlogon Notify Key Logon Persistence
Status: test
Level: high
Author: frack113
Date: 2021-12-30
Modified: 2023-08-17
File: rules/windows/registry/registry_set/registry_set_winlogon_notify_key.yml
Commit: ccbb0369507f796db0b0ae6854c8a2be471b9d84

Adversaries may abuse features of Winlogon to execute DLLs and/or executables when a user logs in.
Winlogon.exe is a Windows component responsible for actions at logon/logoff as well as the secure attention sequence (SAS) triggered by Ctrl-Alt-Delete.

Log source

product: windows
category: registry_set

Detection

selection:
    TargetObject|endswith: '\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\logon'
    Details|endswith: '.dll'
condition: selection

False positives (as the rule lists them)

Unknown

MITRE ATT&CK ids this rule names

T1547.004

References

https://github.com/redcanaryco/atomic-red-team/blob/f339e7da7d05f6057fdfcdd3742bfcf365fee2a9/atomics/T1547.004/T1547.004.md#atomic-test-3---winlogon-notify-key-logon-persistence---powershell

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/registry/registry_set/registry_set_winlogon_notify_key.yml

Sources and licences

SigmaHQ
"Winlogon Notify Key Logon Persistence" by frack113 (SigmaHQ). Rule: https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ccbb0369507f796db0b0ae6854c8a2be471b9d84/rules/windows/registry/registry_set/registry_set_winlogon_notify_key.yml.
Licensed under the Detection Rule License (DRL) 1.1: https://github.com/SigmaHQ/Detection-Rule-License
Detection Rule License (DRL) 1.1

Cite this page

Dragons Eye Ransomware Tracker, "Sigma rule: Winlogon Notify Key Logon Persistence",
entity page, dataset version ref-75e45792e534, updated 2023-08-17T00:00:00.000Z,
https://ransomware-tracker.com/detections/sigma/bbf59793-6efb-4fa1-95ca-a7d288e52c88 (accessed 2026-11-03).
Underlying source: SigmaHQ rule bbf59793-6efb-4fa1-95ca-a7d288e52c88, commit ccbb0369507f796db0b0ae6854c8a2be471b9d84.

Pages change. The dataset version identifies the data, but no archive of old versions is kept, so this citation cannot be replayed later.