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AdFind Command Activity

Elastic Stack Serverless Security

This rule detects the Active Directory query tool, AdFind.exe. AdFind has legitimate purposes, but it is frequently leveraged by threat actors to perform post-exploitation Active Directory reconnaissance. The AdFind tool has been observed in Trickbot, Ryuk, Maze, and FIN6 campaigns. For Winlogbeat, this rule requires Sysmon.

Rule type: eql

Rule indices:

  • logs-endpoint.events.*
  • winlogbeat-*
  • logs-windows.*

Severity: low

Risk score: 21

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:

Tags:

  • Elastic
  • Host
  • Windows
  • Threat Detection
  • Discovery

Version: 5

Rule authors:

  • Elastic

Rule license: Elastic License v2

Investigation guide

AdFind is a freely available command-line tool used to retrieve information from
Activity Directory (AD). Network discovery and enumeration tools like AdFind are useful to adversaries in the same ways
they are effective for network administrators. This tool provides quick ability to scope AD person/computer objects and
understand subnets and domain information. There are many examples
observed where this tool has been adopted by ransomware and criminal groups and used in compromises.

  • AdFind is a legitimate Active Directory enumeration tool used by network administrators, it's important to understand
    the source of the activity. This could involve identifying the account using AdFind and determining based on the command-lines
    what information was retrieved, then further determining if these actions are in scope of that user's traditional responsibilities.
  • In multiple public references, AdFind is leveraged after initial access is achieved, review previous activity on impacted
    machine looking for suspicious indicators such as previous anti-virus/EDR alerts, phishing emails received, or network traffic
    to suspicious infrastructure
  • This rule has the high chance to produce false positives as it is a legitimate tool used by network administrators. One
    option could be whitelisting specific users or groups who use the tool as part of their daily responsibilities. This can
    be done by leveraging the exception workflow in the Kibana Security App or Elasticsearch API to tune this rule to your environment
  • Malicious behavior with AdFind should be investigated as part of a step within an attack chain. It doesn't happen in
    isolation, so reviewing previous logs/activity from impacted machines could be very telling.
  • Windows Network Enumeration
  • Enumeration of Administrator Accounts
  • Enumeration Command Spawned via WMIPrvSE
  • Immediate response should be taken to validate activity, investigate and potentially isolate activity to prevent further
    post-compromise behavior
  • It's important to understand that AdFind is an Active Directory enumeration tool and can be used for malicious or legitimate
    purposes, so understanding the intent behind the activity will help determine the appropropriate response.

Rule query

process where event.type in ("start", "process_started") and
  (process.name : "AdFind.exe" or process.pe.original_file_name == "AdFind.exe") and
  process.args : ("objectcategory=computer", "(objectcategory=computer)",
                  "objectcategory=person", "(objectcategory=person)",
                  "objectcategory=subnet", "(objectcategory=subnet)",
                  "objectcategory=group", "(objectcategory=group)",
                  "objectcategory=organizationalunit", "(objectcategory=organizationalunit)",
                  "objectcategory=attributeschema", "(objectcategory=attributeschema)",
                  "domainlist", "dcmodes", "adinfo", "dclist", "computers_pwnotreqd", "trustdmp")

Framework: MITRE ATT&CKTM