ATT&CK coverage › Technique
System Services: Service Execution T1569.002
Adversaries may abuse the Windows service control manager to execute malicious commands or payloads. The Windows service control manager (<code>services.exe</code>) is an interface to manage and manipulate services. The service control manager is accessible to users via GUI components as well as system utilities such as <code>sc.exe</code> and Net.
Events covered
11 catalog events are tagged with this technique by at least one rule.
Authoring guide
Patterns shared across the 45 rules above: which fields they filter on, what specific values they look for, and what they exclude. Field names are normalized across vendors so Sigma's Image, Elastic's process.name, and Splunk's process_name collapse into one row. Each rule contributes at most once per row.
Fields filtered most (26 distinct)
The fields most rules look at when detecting this technique. The How column shows the operators authors use (eq, wildcard, regex_match, match) and how often each appears. Sample values are concrete examples to start from, not an exhaustive list.
Top indicator values (178 distinct)
Specific (field, operator, value) combinations the rules check for, ranked by how many rules under this technique use each one. The Corpus reach column counts how many rules across the entire catalog (any technique) check the same combination. High numbers point to widely-used indicators that are likely noisy on their own; combine them with another condition for useful signal. Blank means the combination is specific to rules under this technique.
Common exclusions (29 distinct)
Field/operator/value combinations that rules under this technique routinely exclude (top-level not() clauses). These are the false-positive paths the community has learned to filter out. A new rule that ignores the high-count entries here will likely fire on the same noisy paths.
Rules under this technique
Every rule in the catalog tagged with this technique, grouped by vendor. Click a rule title for its full predicates, exclusions, and indicators.
Sigma 36 rules
- CobaltStrike Service Installations - Security
- CobaltStrike Service Installations - System
- Credential Dumping Tools Service Execution - Security
- Credential Dumping Tools Service Execution - System
- CSExec Service File Creation
- CSExec Service Installation
- HackTool - SharpUp PrivEsc Tool Execution
- HackTool Service Registration or Execution
- Metasploit Or Impacket Service Installation Via SMB PsExec
- PAExec Service Installation
- Potential CobaltStrike Service Installations - Registry
- PowerShell as a Service in Registry
- PowerShell Scripts Installed as Services
- PowerShell Scripts Installed as Services - Security
- ProcessHacker Privilege Elevation
- PSExec and WMI Process Creations Block
- PsExec Service File Creation
- PsExec Service Installation
- PsExec Tool Execution From Suspicious Locations - PipeName
- PUA - CSExec Default Named Pipe
- PUA - CsExec Execution
- PUA - NirCmd Execution
- PUA - NirCmd Execution As LOCAL SYSTEM
- PUA - NSudo Execution
- PUA - PAExec Default Named Pipe
- PUA - RemCom Default Named Pipe
- PUA - RunXCmd Execution
- RemCom Service File Creation
- RemCom Service Installation
- Remote Access Tool Services Have Been Installed - Security
- Remote Access Tool Services Have Been Installed - System
- Rundll32 Execution Without Parameters
- Sliver C2 Default Service Installation
- smbexec.py Service Installation
- Start Windows Service Via Net.EXE
- WFP Filter Added via Registry
Elastic 1 rule
Splunk 7 rules
- Excessive Usage Of SC Service Utility
- First Time Seen Running Windows Service
- Malicious Powershell Executed As A Service
- Windows Service Create SliverC2
- Windows Service Created with Suspicious Service Name
- Windows Service Created with Suspicious Service Path
- Windows Snake Malware Service Create