Malicious Defender Exclusion Added via Add-MpPreference (via process_creation)

PremiumReviewedSigma · High · v1
Category
process_creation
Author
HuntRule
Published
2026-10-16
Updated
2026-10-16

ATT&CK techniques

  1. Recon

  2. Resource Dev

  3. Initial Access

  4. Execution

  5. Persistence

  6. Priv Esc

  7. Defense Evasion

  8. Cred Access

  9. Discovery

  10. Lateral Movement

  11. Collection

  12. C2

  13. Exfiltration

  14. Impact

What it detects

This rule detects use of the Add-MpPreference cmdlet to add a Microsoft Defender exclusion, observed as MetaStealer excluded executable files from scanning. Adding exclusions blinds the antivirus to malicious binaries in the excluded scope. This defence evasion clears the way for the infostealer to run and persist without detection.

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Malicious Microsoft Defender Disable via Registry by Key Group
Suspicious Process Made Critical via RtlSetProcessIsCritical (via ps_script)
Malicious Defender Exclusion Added for User Profile Path
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Malicious Defender Exclusion Added via Add-MpPreference (via process_creation)
Pivot detection · T1685 · 9 related

Detection content is published as a reviewed draft. Tune thresholds and exclusions against your own telemetry before enabling this rule for alerting.