Detection rules › Sigma
Scheduled Task Creation Masquerading as System Processes
Detects the creation of scheduled tasks that involve system processes, which may indicate malicious actors masquerading as or abusing these processes to execute payloads or maintain persistence.
MITRE ATT&CK coverage
| Tactic | Techniques |
|---|---|
| Execution | T1053.005 Scheduled Task/Job: Scheduled Task |
| Persistence | T1053.005 Scheduled Task/Job: Scheduled Task |
| Privilege Escalation | T1053.005 Scheduled Task/Job: Scheduled Task |
| Defense Evasion | T1036.004 Masquerading: Masquerade Task or Service, T1036.005 Masquerading: Match Legitimate Resource Name or Location |
Event coverage
| Provider | Event ID | Title |
|---|---|---|
| Sysmon | 1 | Process creation |
Stages and Predicates
Stage 1: all of selection_img
or:
Image|endswith: '\schtasks.exe'
OriginalFileName: schtasks.exe
Stage 2: all of selection_cli
or:
CommandLine|contains: ' audiodg'
CommandLine|contains: ' conhost'
CommandLine|contains: ' dwm.exe'
CommandLine|contains: ' explorer'
CommandLine|contains: ' lsass'
CommandLine|contains: ' lsm'
CommandLine|contains: ' mmc'
CommandLine|contains: ' msiexec'
CommandLine|contains: ' regsvr32'
CommandLine|contains: ' rundll32'
CommandLine|contains: ' services'
CommandLine|contains: ' spoolsv'
CommandLine|contains: ' svchost'
CommandLine|contains: ' taskeng'
CommandLine|contains: ' taskhost'
CommandLine|contains: ' wininit'
CommandLine|contains: ' winlogon'
CommandLine|contains: ' /create '
Indicators
Each row is a field, operator, and value that the rule matches. The corpus column counts how many other rules in the catalog look for the same combination: high numbers point to widely-used, community-vetted indicators. Blank or 1 shows that the indicator is specific to this rule.
| Field | Kind | Values |
|---|---|---|
CommandLine | match |
|
Image | ends_with |
|
OriginalFileName | eq |
|