Windows Backup Deleted Via Wbadmin.EXE

Severity: medium
Author: frack113, Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)
Source: upstream

Detects the deletion of backups or system state backups via "wbadmin.exe". This technique is used by numerous ransomware families and actors. This may only be successful on server platforms that have Windows Backup enabled.

MITRE ATT&CK coverage

Tactic	Techniques
Impact	`T1490` Inhibit System Recovery

Event coverage

Provider	Event ID	Title
Sysmon	1	Process creation

Stages and Predicates

Stage 1: `all of selection_img`

or:
Image|endswith: '\wbadmin.exe'
OriginalFileName: WBADMIN.EXE

Stage 2: `all of selection_cli`

CommandLine|contains: backup
CommandLine|contains: 'delete '

Stage 3: `not 1 of filter_main_keep_versions`

CommandLine|contains: 'keepVersions:0'

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	`backup` corpus 4 (sigma 4) `delete` corpus 4 (sigma 4) `keepVersions:0` corpus 2 (sigma 2)
`Image`	ends_with	`\wbadmin.exe` corpus 6 (sigma 6)
`OriginalFileName`	eq	`WBADMIN.EXE` corpus 6 (sigma 6)