Service Startup Type Change Via Wmic.EXE

Status: experimental
Severity: medium
Log source: category process_creation, product windows
Author: Swachchhanda Shrawan Poudel (Nextron Systems)
Source: github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma

Detects changes to service startup type to 'disabled' or 'manual' using the WMIC command-line utility.

Known false positives

Legitimate administrative changes to service startup types using WMIC, investigate accordingly.

MITRE ATT&CK coverage

Tactic	Techniques
Execution	`T1047` Windows Management Instrumentation
Defense Impairment	`T1685` Disable or Modify Tools

Telemetry coverage

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

Rule body

title: Service Startup Type Change Via Wmic.EXE
id: c0514f28-fdae-42df-b886-06e2b2bc5b37
status: experimental
description: |
    Detects changes to service startup type to 'disabled' or 'manual' using the WMIC command-line utility.
references:
    - https://blog.talosintelligence.com/uncovering-qilin-attack-methods-exposed-through-multiple-cases/
author: Swachchhanda Shrawan Poudel (Nextron Systems)
date: 2026-04-27
tags:
    - attack.execution
    - attack.defense-impairment
    - attack.t1047
    - attack.t1685
logsource:
    category: process_creation
    product: windows
detection:
    selection_img:
        - Image|endswith: '\WMIC.exe'
        - OriginalFileName: 'wmic.exe'
    selection_cli:
        CommandLine|contains|all:
            - ' service '
            - 'ChangeStartMode'
        CommandLine|contains:
            - 'Manual'
            - 'Disabled'
    condition: all of selection_*
falsepositives:
    - Legitimate administrative changes to service startup types using WMIC, investigate accordingly.
level: medium
regression_tests_path: regression_data/rules/windows/process_creation/proc_creation_win_wmic_service_startup_change/info.yml

Stages and Predicates

Stage 0: `condition`

all of selection_*

Stage 1: `selection_img`

selection_img:
    - Image|endswith: '\WMIC.exe'
    - OriginalFileName: 'wmic.exe'

Stage 2: `selection_cli`

selection_cli:
    CommandLine|contains|all:
        - ' service '
        - 'ChangeStartMode'
    CommandLine|contains:
        - 'Manual'
        - 'Disabled'

Indicators

These rows show field, operator, and value matches.

Field	Kind	Values	Search
`CommandLine`	match	`service` corpus 2 (sigma 2) `ChangeStartMode` `Disabled` corpus 7 (sigma 5, elastic 1, splunk 1) `Manual` corpus 2 (sigma 2)	`field:"CommandLine" kind:match`
`Image`	ends_with	`\WMIC.exe` corpus 62 (sigma 62)	`field:"Image" kind:ends_with value:"\WMIC.exe"`
`OriginalFileName`	eq	`wmic.exe` corpus 80 (sigma 38, elastic 24, splunk 18)	`field:"OriginalFileName" kind:eq value:"wmic.exe"`

Service Startup Type Change Via Wmic.EXE

Known false positives

MITRE ATT&CK coverage

Telemetry coverage

Rule body

Stages and Predicates

Stage 0: condition

Stage 1: selection_img

Stage 2: selection_cli

Indicators

Stage 0: `condition`

Stage 1: `selection_img`

Stage 2: `selection_cli`