Shell Execution via Apple Scripting

Elastic Stack Serverless Security

Identifies the execution of the shell process (sh) via scripting (JXA or AppleScript). Adversaries may use the doShellScript functionality in JXA or do shell script in AppleScript to execute system commands.

Rule type: eql

Rule indices:

• auditbeat-*
• logs-endpoint.events.*

Severity: medium

Risk score: 47

Runs every: 5m

Searches indices from: now-9m (https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/common-options.html#date-math[Date Math format], see also Additional look-back time)

Maximum alerts per execution: 100

References:

• https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/technotes/tn2065/_index.html
• https://objectivebythesea.com/v2/talks/OBTS_v2_Thomas.pdf

Tags:

• Elastic
• Host
• macOS
• Threat Detection
• Execution

Version: 3

Rule authors:

• Elastic

Rule license: Elastic License v2

sequence by host.id with maxspan=5s
 [process where event.type in ("start", "process_started", "info") and process.name == "osascript"] by process.pid
 [process where event.type in ("start", "process_started") and process.name == "sh" and process.args == "-c"] by process.parent.pid

Framework: MITRE ATT&CKTM

• Tactic:

  • Name: Execution
  • ID: TA0002
  • Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0002/

• Technique:

  • Name: Command and Scripting Interpreter
  • ID: T1059
  • Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059/