Potential WSUS Abuse for Lateral Movement

Identifies a potential Windows Server Update Services (WSUS) abuse to execute psexec to enable for lateral movement. WSUS is limited to executing Microsoft signed binaries, which limits the executables that can be used to tools published by Microsoft.

Rule type: eql

Rule indices:

logs-endpoint.events.process-*
logs-windows.sysmon_operational-*
endgame-*
logs-sentinel_one_cloud_funnel.*
logs-m365_defender.event-*
logs-system.security-*
winlogbeat-*

Severity: medium

Risk score: 47

Runs every: 5m

Searches indices from: now-9m (Date Math format, see also Additional look-back time)

Maximum alerts per execution: 100

References:

https://www.thehacker.recipes/a-d/movement/mitm-and-coerced-authentications/wsus-spoofing

Tags:

Domain: Endpoint
OS: Windows
Use Case: Threat Detection
Tactic: Lateral Movement
Data Source: Elastic Endgame
Data Source: Elastic Defend
Data Source: Sysmon
Data Source: SentinelOne
Data Source: Microsoft Defender for Endpoint
Data Source: System

Version: 104

Rule authors:

Elastic

Rule license: Elastic License v2

Rule query

edit

process where host.os.type == "windows" and event.type == "start" and process.parent.name : "wuauclt.exe" and
process.executable : "?:\\Windows\\SoftwareDistribution\\Download\\Install\\*" and
(process.name : "psexec64.exe" or ?process.pe.original_file_name : "psexec.c")

Framework: MITRE ATT&CK^TM

Tactic:
- Name: Lateral Movement
- ID: TA0008
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0008/
Technique:
- Name: Exploitation of Remote Services
- ID: T1210
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1210/

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