Security Software Discovery via Findstr.exe (Windows Event Log)

id: '43757.85555'
title: Security Software Discovery via Findstr.exe
description: Threat actors may enumerate security software, configurations, and monitoring
  tools on a system or cloud environment to evade defenses or tailor their attack.
  This can involve querying registry keys, running system commands, or checking for
  specific processes related to security tools. This use case detects instances where
  findstr.exe or find.exe are executed to search for security software on the host.
logic_format: Splunk
logic: '`get_endpoint_data` `get_endpoint_data_winevent` (TERM(EventCode=4688) OR
  "<EventID>4688<" OR Type=Process) ("findstr.exe" OR TERM(findstr) OR "find.exe"
  OR TERM(find)) ("avira" OR "cb" OR "cylance" OR "defender" OR "kaspersky" OR "kes"
  OR "mc" OR "sec" OR "sentinel" OR "symantec" OR "virus" OR "wrsa" OR "opssvc" OR
  "avastui" OR "avgui" OR "bdservicehost" OR "nsWscSvc" OR "ekrn" OR "sophoshealth"
  OR "falcon") | where match(process_path, "(?i)\x5cWindows\x5cSystem32\x5cfindstr\.exe|\x5cWindows\x5cSysWOW64\x5cfind\.exe")
  and match(process, "(?i)\w+(\.exe)?\x22?\s+(avira|cb|cylance|defender|kaspersky|kes|mc|sec|sentinel|symantec|virus|wrsa|opssvc|avastui|avgui|bdservicehost|nsWscSvc|ekrn|sophoshealth|falcon)\x22?$")
  | table _time, host, user, process, process_*, parent_* | bin span=1s | stats values(*)
  as * by _time, host '
techniques:
- discovery:software discovery:security software discovery
technique_id:
- T1518.001
data_category:
- Process command-line parameters
- Windows event logs
references:
- https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1518/001/
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/findstr
- https://github.com/redcanaryco/atomic-red-team/blob/987e3ca988ae3cff4b9f6e388c139c05bf44bbb8/atomics/T1518.001/T1518.001.md#atomic-test-1---security-software-discovery
- https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2025/03/06/malvertising-campaign-leads-to-info-stealers-hosted-on-github/
- https://detection.fyi/sigmahq/sigma/windows/process_creation/proc_creation_win_findstr_security_keyword_lookup/