Detection rules › Splunk
Windows Security And Backup Services Stop
The following analytic detects the suspicious termination of known services commonly targeted by ransomware before file encryption. It leverages Windows System Event Logs (EventCode 7036) to identify when critical services such as Volume Shadow Copy, backup, and antivirus services are stopped. This activity is significant because ransomware often disables these services to avoid errors and ensure successful file encryption. If confirmed malicious, this behavior could lead to widespread data encryption, rendering files inaccessible and potentially causing significant operational disruption and data loss.
MITRE ATT&CK coverage
| Tactic | Techniques |
|---|---|
| Impact | T1490 Inhibit System Recovery |
Event coverage
| Provider | Event ID | Title |
|---|---|---|
| Service-Control-Manager | 7036 |
Stages and Predicates
Stage 1: search
search
Stage 2: rename
rename
Stage 3: where
where (display_name="(?i)(Volume Shadow Copy|VSS|backup|sophos|sql|memtas|mepocs|veeam|svc\$|DefWatch|ccEvtMgr|ccSetMgr|SavRoam|RTVscan|QBFCService|QBIDPService|Intuit\.QuickBooks\.FCS|QBCFMonitorService|YooBackup|YooIT|Veeam|PDVFSService|BackupExec|WdBoot|WdFilter|WdNisDrv|WdNisSvc|WinDefend|wscsvc|Sense|sppsvc|SecurityHealthService)" OR normalized_service_name="(?i)(Volume Shadow Copy|VSS|backup|sophos|sql|memtas|mepocs|veeam|svc\$|DefWatch|ccEvtMgr|ccSetMgr|SavRoam|RTVscan|QBFCService|QBIDPService|Intuit\.QuickBooks\.FCS|QBCFMonitorService|YooBackup|YooIT|Veeam|PDVFSService|BackupExec|WdBoot|WdFilter|WdNisDrv|WdNisSvc|WinDefend|wscsvc|Sense|sppsvc|SecurityHealthService)") param2="stopped"
Stage 4: stats
stats BY EventCode, display_name, dest, normalized_service_name
Stage 5: search
search
Stage 6: search
search
Stage 7: search
search `macro`
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 |
|---|---|---|
display_name | match |
|
normalized_service_name | match |
|
param2 | eq |
|