CAPEC-653: Use of Known Operating System Credentials
An adversary guesses or obtains (i.e. steals or purchases) legitimate operating system credentials (e.g. userID/password) to achieve authentication and to perform authorized actions on the system, under the guise of an authenticated user or service. This applies to any Operating System.
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Overview
This attack can be extremely harmful when the operating system credentials used are for a root or admin user. Once an adversary gains access using credentials with elevated privileges, they are free to alter important system files which can effect other users who may use the system or other users on the system's network.
How the attack works
The phases an attacker typically follows to carry out this attack.
- Step 1Explore
[Acquire known operating system credentials] The adversary must obtain known operating system credentials in order to access the target system, application, or service within the domain.
- An adversary purchases breached operating system username/password combinations or leaked hashed passwords from the dark web.
- An adversary leverages a key logger or phishing attack to steal user credentials as they are provided.
- An adversary conducts a sniffing attack to steal operating system credentials as they are transmitted.
- An adversary gains access to a system/files and exfiltrates password hashes.
- An adversary examines outward-facing configuration and properties files to discover hardcoded credentials.
- Step 2Experiment
[Attempt authentication] Try each operating system credential against various systems, applications, and services within the domain until the target grants access.
- Manually or automatically enter each credential through the target's interface.
- Step 3Exploit
[Impersonate] An adversary can use successful experiments or authentications to impersonate an authorized user or system, or to laterally move within the network
- Step 4Exploit
[Spoofing] Malicious data can be injected into the target system or into other systems on the network. The adversary can also pose as a legitimate user to perform social engineering attacks.
- Step 5Exploit
[Data Exfiltration] The adversary can obtain sensitive data contained within system files or application configuration.
What the attacker needs
Prerequisites
- The system/application uses one factor password-based authentication, SSO, and/or cloud-based authentication.
- The system/application does not have a sound password policy that is being enforced.
- The system/application does not implement an effective password throttling mechanism.
- The adversary possesses a list of known user accounts and corresponding passwords that may exist on the target.
Skills required
- Low skill: Once an adversary obtains a known credential, leveraging it is trivial.
Resources required
- A list of known credentials for the targeted domain.
- A custom script that leverages a credential list to launch an attack.
Consequences
What a successful CAPEC-653 attack can achieve.
Gain Privileges
Affects: Confidentiality, Access Control, Authentication
Read Data
Affects: Confidentiality, Authorization
Modify Data
Affects: Integrity
How to mitigate it
Defenses that reduce the risk of CAPEC-653.
- Leverage multi-factor authentication for all authentication services and prior to granting an entity access to the network.
- Create a strong password policy and ensure that your system enforces this policy.
- Ensure users are not reusing username/password combinations for multiple systems, applications, or services.
- Do not reuse local administrator account credentials across systems.
- Deny remote use of local admin credentials to log into domain systems.
- Do not allow accounts to be a local administrator on more than one system.
- Implement an intelligent password throttling mechanism. Care must be taken to assure that these mechanisms do not excessively enable account lockout attacks such as CAPEC-2.
- Monitor system and domain logs for abnormal credential access.
How to detect it
Indicators that this attack may be underway.
- Authentication attempts use credentials that have been used previously by the account in question.
- Authentication attempts are originating from IP addresses or locations that are inconsistent with a user's normal IP addresses or locations.
- Data is being transferred and/or removed from systems/applications within the network.
- Suspicious or Malicious software is downloaded/installed on systems within the domain.
- Messages from a legitimate user appear to contain suspicious links or communications not consistent with the user's normal behavior.
Examples
Adversaries exploited the Zoom video conferencing application during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic to exfiltrate Windows domain credentials from a target system. The attack entailed sending Universal Naming Convention (UNC) paths within the Zoom chat window of an unprotected Zoom call. If the victim clicked on the link, their Windows usernames and the corresponding Net-NTLM-v2 hashes were sent to the address contained in the link. The adversary was then able to infiltrate and laterally move within the Windows domain by passing the acquired credentials to shared network resources. This further provided adversaries with access to Outlook servers and network storage devices. [REF-575]
Mimikatz, a post-exploitation Windows credential harvester, can be used to gather and exploit Windows credentials. This malware has been used in several known cyberattacks, such as the Petya Ransomeware attacks. [REF-576]
Frequently asked questions
Common questions about CAPEC-653.
- What is CAPEC-653?
- An adversary guesses or obtains (i.e. steals or purchases) legitimate operating system credentials (e.g. userID/password) to achieve authentication and to perform authorized actions on the system, under the guise of an authenticated user or service. This applies to any Operating System.
- How does a Use of Known Operating System Credentials attack work?
- It typically unfolds over 5 phases. It begins with: [Acquire known operating system credentials] The adversary must obtain known operating system credentials in order to access the target system, application, or service within the domain.
- How do you prevent CAPEC-653?
- Leverage multi-factor authentication for all authentication services and prior to granting an entity access to the network.
- What weaknesses does CAPEC-653 target?
- CAPEC-653 exploits 7 CWE weaknesses, including CWE-262 (Not Using Password Aging), CWE-263 (Password Aging with Long Expiration), CWE-307 (Improper Restriction of Excessive Authentication Attempts), CWE-308 (Use of Single-factor Authentication).
- How severe is CAPEC-653?
- MITRE rates CAPEC-653 as High severity with high likelihood of attack.
References
Attack-pattern data is sourced from the MITRE CAPEC catalog (v3.9). Weakness associations link to the corresponding CWE entries on RadicalNotion.AI.
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