FakeUpdates/SocGholish Activity

Status: test
Severity: high
Log source: category process_creation, product windows
Author: @kostastsale
Source: github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma

Detects initial execution of FakeUpdates/SocGholish malware via wscript that later executes commands via cmd or powershell.

Known false positives

Unlikely

MITRE ATT&CK coverage

Tactic	Techniques
Execution	`T1059.001` Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell

Telemetry coverage

Provider	Record / event type
Sysmon	Event ID 1: Process creation

Rule body

title: FakeUpdates/SocGholish Activity
id: 97805087-93ab-4203-b5cb-287cda6aecaa
status: test
description: Detects initial execution of FakeUpdates/SocGholish malware via wscript that later executes commands via cmd or powershell.
references:
    - https://twitter.com/th3_protoCOL/status/1536788652889497600
    - https://twitter.com/1ZRR4H/status/1537501582727778304
author: '@kostastsale'
date: 2022-06-16
modified: 2024-08-23
tags:
    - attack.execution
    - attack.t1059.001
    - detection.emerging-threats
logsource:
    category: process_creation
    product: windows
detection:
    selection:
        ParentImage|endswith: '\wscript.exe'
        ParentCommandLine|contains|all:
            - '\AppData\Local\Temp'
            - '.zip'
            - 'update'
            - '.js'
        ParentCommandLine|contains:
            - 'Chrome'
            - 'Edge'
            - 'Firefox'
            - 'Opera'
            - 'Brave' # Not seen in campaigns
            - 'Vivaldi' # Not seen in campaigns
        Image|endswith:
            - '\cmd.exe'
            - '\powershell.exe'
            - '\pwsh.exe'
    condition: selection
falsepositives:
    - Unlikely
level: high

Stages and Predicates

Stage 0: `condition`

selection

Stage 1: `selection`

selection:
    ParentImage|endswith: '\wscript.exe'
    ParentCommandLine|contains|all:
        - '\AppData\Local\Temp'
        - '.zip'
        - 'update'
        - '.js'
    ParentCommandLine|contains:
        - 'Chrome'
        - 'Edge'
        - 'Firefox'
        - 'Opera'
        - 'Brave'
        - 'Vivaldi'
    Image|endswith:
        - '\cmd.exe'
        - '\powershell.exe'
        - '\pwsh.exe'

Indicators

These rows show field, operator, and value matches.

Field	Kind	Values	Search
`Image`	ends_with	`\cmd.exe` corpus 130 (sigma 130) `\powershell.exe` corpus 179 (sigma 178, kusto 1) `\pwsh.exe` corpus 165 (sigma 164, kusto 1)	`field:"Image" kind:ends_with`
`ParentCommandLine`	match	`.js` corpus 2 (sigma 2) `.zip` `Brave` `Chrome` `Edge` `Firefox` `Opera` `Vivaldi` `\AppData\Local\Temp` corpus 2 (sigma 2) `update`	`field:"ParentCommandLine" kind:match`
`ParentImage`	ends_with	`\wscript.exe` corpus 19 (sigma 19)	`field:"ParentImage" kind:ends_with value:"\wscript.exe"`

FakeUpdates/SocGholish Activity

Known false positives

MITRE ATT&CK coverage

Telemetry coverage

Rule body

Stages and Predicates

Stage 0: condition

Stage 1: selection

Indicators

Stage 0: `condition`

Stage 1: `selection`