Boot or Logon Autostart Execution: XDG Autostart Entries T1547.013

Tactics: Persistence, Privilege Escalation

Adversaries may add or modify XDG Autostart Entries to execute malicious programs or commands when a user’s desktop environment is loaded at login. XDG Autostart entries are available for any XDG-compliant Linux system. XDG Autostart entries use Desktop Entry files (`.desktop`) to configure the user’s desktop environment upon user login. These configuration files determine what applications launch upon user login, define associated applications to open specific file types, and define applications used to open removable media.

Authoring guide

Patterns shared across the 5 rules above: which fields they filter on, what specific values they look for, and what they exclude. The catalog normalizes field names 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 (11 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
host.os.type5eq 5
EventType4eq 2, in 2exec, exec_event, ProcessRollup2, connection_attempted, start
event.type4eq 4start, creation
process.args3eq 2, starts_with 2, in 1, wildcard 1+x, --, --restart=Never, -c, -e
Image2eq 1, is_not_null 1/bin/sh
TargetFilename2wildcard 2/boot/efi/efi/*/grub.cfg, /boot/grub/grub.cfg, /boot/grub2/grub.cfg, /etc/xdg/autostart/*, /home/*/.config/autostart-scripts/*
process_name2eq 2, in 1chmod, ctl, docker, install, kubectl
CommandLine1wildcard 1* nc *, * nc.traditional *, * ncat *
ParentImage1eq 1/usr/bin/xfce4-session
data_stream.dataset1eq 1fim.event
file.extension1in 1desktop, sh

Top indicator values (248 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. Click a value to expand the rules under this technique that use it.

FieldKindValueRules (here)Corpus reach
event.typeeq
start
3606
EventTypein
exec
2171
EventTypein
exec_event
2139
EventTypein
start
2134
TargetFilenamewildcard
/etc/xdg/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/home/*/.config/autostart-scripts/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/home/*/.config/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/home/*/.kde/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/home/*/.kde/share/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/home/*/.kde4/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/home/*/.kde4/share/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/home/*/.local/share/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/root/.config/autostart-scripts/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/root/.config/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/root/.kde/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/root/.kde/share/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/root/.kde4/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/root/.kde4/share/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/root/.local/share/autostart/*
22
TargetFilenamewildcard
/usr/share/autostart/*
22
CommandLinewildcard
* nc *
12
CommandLinewildcard
* nc.traditional *
1
CommandLinewildcard
* ncat *
1
CommandLinewildcard
* netcat *
1
CommandLinewildcard
*./.*
1
CommandLinewildcard
*/boot/*
1
CommandLinewildcard
*/dev/shm/*
13
CommandLinewildcard
*/dev/tcp/*
12
CommandLinewildcard
*/etc/init.d*
12
CommandLinewildcard
*/etc/ld.so*
12

Exclusions (89 distinct)

Field/operator/value combinations excluded by rules under this technique (top-level not() clauses), sorted by how many rules exclude each. These are the false-positive paths the community has learned to filter out. A new rule that ignores the high-count entries here will likely fire on the same noisy paths. Click a value to expand the rules under this technique that exclude it.

FieldKindValueRules excluding
process_namein
remmina
2
CommandLinein
chmod 755 /etc/update-motd.d/
1
CommandLinein
chmod 777 /etc/update-motd.d/
1
Imagein
/opt/google/chrome/chrome
1
Imagein
/sbin/mkhomedir_helper
1
Imagein
/usr/bin/crio
1
Imagein
/usr/bin/dnf5
1
Imagein
/usr/bin/nextcloud
1
Imagein
/usr/bin/pamac-daemon
1
Imagein
/usr/bin/sealert
1
Imagein
/usr/libexec/platform-python
1
Imagein
/usr/libexec/xdg-desktop-portal
1
Imagein
/usr/sbin/gdm
1
Imagein
/usr/sbin/mkhomedir_helper
1
Imagein
/usr/sbin/sshd
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.

Platform (all)
Domain (all)

Elastic 5 rules