EXPLORE DETECTIONS
AWS Credentials Searched For Inside A Container
This rule detects the use of system search utilities like grep and find to search for AWS credentials inside a container. Unauthorized access to these sensitive files could lead to further compromise of the container environment or facilitate a container breakout to the underlying cloud environment.
AWS Defense Evasion Delete Cloudtrail
The following analytic detects the deletion of AWS CloudTrail logs by identifying `DeleteTrail` events within CloudTrail logs. This detection leverages CloudTrail data to monitor for successful `DeleteTrail` actions, excluding those initiated from the AWS console. This activity is significant because adversaries may delete CloudTrail logs to evade detection and operate stealthily within the compromised environment. If confirmed malicious, this action could allow attackers to cover their tracks, making it difficult to trace their activities and potentially leading to prolonged unauthorized access and further exploitation.
AWS Defense Evasion Delete CloudWatch Log Group
The following analytic detects the deletion of CloudWatch log groups in AWS, identified through `DeleteLogGroup` events in CloudTrail logs. This detection leverages CloudTrail data to monitor for successful log group deletions, excluding console-based actions. This activity is significant as it indicates potential attempts to evade logging and monitoring, which is crucial for maintaining visibility into AWS activities. If confirmed malicious, this could allow attackers to hide their tracks, making it difficult to detect further malicious actions or investigate incidents within the compromised AWS environment.
AWS Defense Evasion Impair Security Services
The following analytic detects attempts to impair or disable AWS security services by monitoring specific deletion operations across GuardDuty, AWS WAF (classic and v2), CloudWatch, Route 53, and CloudWatch Logs. These actions include deleting detectors, rule groups, IP sets, web ACLs, logging configurations, alarms, and log streams. Adversaries may perform such operations to evade detection or remove visibility from defenders. By explicitly pairing eventName values with their corresponding eventSource services, this detection reduces noise and ensures that only security-related deletions are flagged. It leverages CloudTrail logs to identify specific API calls like "DeleteLogStream" and "DeleteDetector." This activity is significant because it indicates potential efforts to disable security monitoring and evade detection. If confirmed malicious, this could allow attackers to operate undetected, escalate privileges, or exfiltrate data without triggering security alerts, severely compromising the security posture of the AWS environment.
AWS Defense Evasion PutBucketLifecycle
The following analytic detects `PutBucketLifecycle` events in AWS CloudTrail logs where a user sets a lifecycle rule for an S3 bucket with an expiration period of fewer than three days. This detection leverages CloudTrail logs to identify suspicious lifecycle configurations. This activity is significant because attackers may use it to delete CloudTrail logs quickly, thereby evading detection and impairing forensic investigations. If confirmed malicious, this could allow attackers to cover their tracks, making it difficult to trace their actions and respond to the breach effectively.
AWS Defense Evasion Stop Logging Cloudtrail
The following analytic detects `StopLogging` events in AWS CloudTrail logs. It leverages CloudTrail event data to identify when logging is intentionally stopped, excluding console-based actions and focusing on successful attempts. This activity is significant because adversaries may stop logging to evade detection and operate stealthily within the compromised environment. If confirmed malicious, this action could allow attackers to perform further activities without being logged, hindering incident response and forensic investigations, and potentially leading to unauthorized access or data exfiltration.
AWS Defense Evasion Update Cloudtrail
The following analytic detects `UpdateTrail` events in AWS CloudTrail logs. It identifies attempts to modify CloudTrail settings, potentially to evade logging. The detection leverages CloudTrail logs, focusing on `UpdateTrail` events where the user agent is not the AWS console and the operation is successful. This activity is significant because altering CloudTrail settings can disable or limit logging, hindering visibility into AWS account activities. If confirmed malicious, this could allow attackers to operate undetected, compromising the integrity and security of the AWS environment.
AWS Detect Users creating keys with encrypt policy without MFA
The following analytic detects the creation of AWS KMS keys with an encryption policy accessible to everyone, including external entities. It leverages AWS CloudTrail logs to identify `CreateKey` or `PutKeyPolicy` events where the `kms:Encrypt` action is granted to all principals. This activity is significant as it may indicate a compromised account, allowing an attacker to misuse the encryption key to target other organizations. If confirmed malicious, this could lead to unauthorized data encryption, potentially disrupting operations and compromising sensitive information across multiple entities.
AWS Detect Users with KMS keys performing encryption S3
The following analytic identifies users with KMS keys performing encryption operations on S3 buckets. It leverages AWS CloudTrail logs to detect the `CopyObject` event where server-side encryption with AWS KMS is specified. This activity is significant as it may indicate unauthorized or suspicious encryption of data, potentially masking exfiltration or tampering efforts. If confirmed malicious, an attacker could be encrypting sensitive data to evade detection or preparing it for exfiltration, posing a significant risk to data integrity and confidentiality.
AWS Disable Bucket Versioning
The following analytic detects when AWS S3 bucket versioning is suspended by a user. It leverages AWS CloudTrail logs to identify `PutBucketVersioning` events with the `VersioningConfiguration.Status` set to `Suspended`. This activity is significant because disabling versioning can prevent recovery of deleted or modified data, which is a common tactic in ransomware attacks. If confirmed malicious, this action could lead to data loss and hinder recovery efforts, severely impacting data integrity and availability.
AWS Discovery API Calls via CLI from a Single Resource
Detects when a single AWS resource is running multiple read-only, discovery API calls in a 10-second window. This behavior could indicate an actor attempting to discover the AWS infrastructure using compromised credentials or a compromised instance. Adversaries may use this information to identify potential targets for further exploitation or to gain a better understanding of the target's infrastructure.
AWS DynamoDB Scan by Unusual User
Identifies when an AWS DynamoDB table is scanned by a user who does not typically perform this action. Adversaries may use the Scan operation to collect sensitive information or exfiltrate data from DynamoDB tables. This rule detects unusual user activity by monitoring for the Scan action in CloudTrail logs. This is a New Terms rule that only flags when this behavior is observed by a user or role for the first time.
AWS DynamoDB Table Exported to S3
Identifies when an AWS DynamoDB table is exported to S3. Adversaries may use the ExportTableToPointInTime operation to collect sensitive information or exfiltrate data from DynamoDB tables. This rule detects unusual user activity by monitoring for the ExportTableToPointInTime action in CloudTrail logs. This is a New Terms rule that only flags when this behavior is observed by a user or role for the first time.
AWS EC2 AMI Shared with Another Account
Identifies an AWS Amazon Machine Image (AMI) being shared with another AWS account. Adversaries with access may share an AMI with an external AWS account as a means of data exfiltration. AMIs can contain secrets, bash histories, code artifacts, and other sensitive data that adversaries may abuse if shared with unauthorized accounts. AMIs can be made publicly available accidentally as well.
AWS EC2 Deprecated AMI Discovery
Identifies when a user has queried for deprecated Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) in AWS. This may indicate an adversary looking for outdated AMIs that may be vulnerable to exploitation. While deprecated AMIs are not inherently malicious or indicative of a breach, they may be more susceptible to vulnerabilities and should be investigated for potential security risks.
AWS EC2 Disable EBS Encryption
Identifies disabling of default Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) encryption in the current region. Disabling default encryption does not change the encryption status of your existing volumes.
AWS EC2 EBS Snapshot Access Removed
Identifies the removal of access permissions from a shared AWS EC2 EBS snapshot. EBS snapshots are essential for data retention and disaster recovery. Adversaries may revoke or modify snapshot permissions to prevent legitimate users from accessing backups, thereby obstructing recovery efforts after data loss or destructive actions. This tactic can also be used to evade detection or maintain exclusive access to critical backups, ultimately increasing the impact of an attack and complicating incident response.
AWS EC2 EBS Snapshot Shared or Made Public
Detects when an Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) snapshot is shared with another AWS account or made public. EBS snapshots contain copies of data volumes that may include sensitive or regulated information. Adversaries may exploit ModifySnapshotAttribute to share snapshots with external accounts or the public, allowing them to copy and access data in an environment they control. This activity often precedes data exfiltration or persistence operations, where the attacker transfers stolen data out of the victim account or prepares a staging area for further exploitation.
AWS EC2 Encryption Disabled
Detects when Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) encryption by default is disabled in an AWS region. EBS encryption ensures that newly created volumes and snapshots are automatically protected with AWS Key Management Service (KMS) keys. Disabling this setting introduces significant risk as all future volumes created in that region will be unencrypted by default, potentially exposing sensitive data at rest. Adversaries may disable encryption to weaken data protection before exfiltrating or tampering with EBS volumes or snapshots. This may be a step in preparation for data theft or ransomware-style attacks that depend on unencrypted volumes.
AWS EC2 Export Task
Identifies successful export tasks of EC2 instances via the APIs CreateInstanceExportTask, ExportImage, or CreateStoreImageTask. These exports can be used by administrators for legitimate VM migration or backup workflows however, an attacker with access to an EC2 instance or AWS credentials can export a VM or its image and then transfer it off-account for exfiltration of data.
AWS EC2 Full Network Packet Capture Detected
Detects successful creation of an Amazon EC2 Traffic Mirroring session. A session copies full packets from a source Elastic Network Interface (ENI) to a mirror target (e.g., an ENI or NLB) using a mirror filter (ingress/egress rules). While used for diagnostics and NDR/IDS tooling, adversaries can abuse sessions to covertly capture and exfiltrate sensitive, potentially unencrypted, traffic from instances or subnets.
AWS EC2 Instance Connect SSH Public Key Uploaded
Identifies when a new SSH public key is uploaded to an AWS EC2 instance using the EC2 Instance Connect service. This action could indicate an adversary attempting to maintain access to the instance. The rule detects the SendSerialConsoleSSHPublicKey or SendSSHPublicKey API actions, which are logged when manually uploading an SSH key to an EC2 instance or serial connection. It is important to know that this API call happens automatically by the EC2 Instance Connect service when a user connects to an EC2 instance using the EC2 Instance Connect service via the CLI or AWS Management Console.
AWS EC2 Instance Console Login via Assumed Role
Detects successful AWS Management Console or federation login activity performed using an EC2 instance’s assumed role credentials. EC2 instances typically use temporary credentials to make API calls, not to authenticate interactively via the console. A successful "ConsoleLogin" or "GetSigninToken" event using a session pattern that includes "i-" (the EC2 instance ID) is highly anomalous and may indicate that an adversary obtained the instance’s temporary credentials from the instance metadata service (IMDS) and used them to access the console. Such activity can enable lateral movement, privilege escalation, or persistence within the AWS account.
AWS EC2 LOLBin Execution via SSM SendCommand
Identifies the execution of Living Off the Land Binaries (LOLBins) or GTFOBins on EC2 instances via AWS Systems Manager (SSM) `SendCommand` API. This detection correlates AWS CloudTrail `SendCommand` events with endpoint process execution by matching SSM command IDs. While AWS redacts command parameters in CloudTrail logs, this correlation technique reveals the actual commands executed on EC2 instances. Adversaries may abuse SSM to execute malicious commands remotely without requiring SSH or RDP access, using legitimate system utilities for data exfiltration, establishing reverse shells, or lateral movement.