Scheduled Tasks AT Command Enabled
Elastic Stack Serverless Security
Identifies attempts to enable the Windows scheduled tasks AT command via the registry. Attackers may use this method to move laterally or persist locally. The AT command has been deprecated since Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012, but still exists for backwards compatibility.
Rule type: eql
Rule indices:
- winlogbeat-*
- logs-endpoint.events.*
- logs-windows.*
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:
Tags:
- Elastic
- Host
- Windows
- Threat Detection
- Defense Evasion
Version: 5
Rule authors:
- Elastic
Rule license: Elastic License v2
If enabling an EQL rule on a non-elastic-agent index (such as beats) for versions <8.2, events will not define event.ingested and default fallback for EQL rules was not added until 8.2, so you will need to add a custom pipeline to populate event.ingested to @timestamp for this rule to work.
registry where
registry.path : "HKLM\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\Schedule\\Configuration\\EnableAt" and
registry.data.strings : ("1", "0x00000001")
Framework: MITRE ATT&CKTM
Tactic:
- Name: Defense Evasion
- ID: TA0005
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0005/
Technique:
- Name: Impair Defenses
- ID: T1562
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1562/
Sub-technique:
- Name: Disable or Modify Tools
- ID: T1562.001
- Reference URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1562/001/