ATT&CK coverage › Technique

Hijack Execution Flow: Services Registry Permissions Weakness T1574.011

Adversaries may execute their own malicious payloads by hijacking the Registry entries used by services. Flaws in the permissions for Registry keys related to services can allow adversaries to redirect the originally specified executable to one they control, launching their own code when a service starts. Windows stores local service configuration information in the Registry under <code>HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services</code>. The information stored under a service's Registry keys can be manipulated to modify a service's execution parameters through tools such as the service controller, sc.exe, PowerShell, or Reg. Access to Registry keys is controlled through access control lists and user permissions.

Events covered

5 catalog events are tagged with this technique by at least one rule.

ProviderEvent IDTitle
Sysmon1Process creation
Sysmon13RegistryEvent (Value Set)
Security-Auditing4663An attempt was made to access an object.
Security-Auditing4688A new process has been created.
PowerShell4104Creating Scriptblock text (MessageNumber of MessageTotal).

Authoring guide

Patterns shared across the 12 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 (10 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.

FieldRulesHowSample values
CommandLine7match 7DCLCWPDTSD, sdset, Set-Service , -sd , ImagePath
Image5ends_with 5\sc.exe, \pwsh.exe, \reg.exe
OriginalFileName3eq 3sc.exe, pwsh.dll
ScriptBlockText3match 3Set-Service , -sd , DCLCWPDTSD, REGISTRY::HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\, get-acl
IntegrityLevel2eq 2S-1-16-8192, Medium
AccessList1match 1%%1538
ObjectName1match 1ControlSet\Services\, \SYSTEM\
registry_path1eq 1"*\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services*"
Details1is_not_null 1
registry_value_name1eq 1ImagePath

Top indicator values (63 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.

FieldKindValueRules (here)Corpus reach
Imageends_with\sc.exe317
CommandLinematchDCLCWPDTSD22
ScriptBlockTextmatch-sd 22
ScriptBlockTextmatchSet-Service 22
ScriptBlockTextmatch-SecurityDescriptorSddl 22
CommandLinematchadd 29
CommandLinematchfailure22
IntegrityLeveleqS-1-16-819223
IntegrityLeveleqMedium23
OriginalFileNameeqsc.exe210
CommandLinematchsdset24
CommandLinematch-sd 12
CommandLinematchSet-Service 12
CommandLinematch-SecurityDescriptorSddl 12
Imageends_with\pwsh.exe1140
OriginalFileNameeqpwsh.dll172
ScriptBlockTextmatchDCLCWPDTSD1
CommandLinematchSYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\1
Imageends_with\reg.exe146
CommandLinematch ImagePath 1

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 11 rules

Splunk 1 rule