Malicious IIS Worker Process Spawning Command Shell via SharePoint ToolShell (via process_creation)

ATT&CK techniques

Initial Access → Persistence

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
- T1190Exploit Public-Facing Application
Execution
Persistence
- T1505.003Web Shell
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects the SharePoint IIS worker process w3wp.exe spawning command interpreters or scripting hosts, a hallmark of web shell execution. Exploitation of CVE-2025-53770 (ToolShell) drives w3wp to launch cmd or PowerShell for post-exploitation, indicating server-side remote code execution.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1190 — drag to rearrange

Malicious Command Shell Spawned by SQL Server via Process Creation (via process_creation)

Possible GoAnywhere MFT Exploitation via Tomcat Spawning Discovery Commands

Suspicious Command Shell Spawned by MSSQL Server Process Indicating Webshell

Malicious MOVEit Transfer Exploitation via X-siLock HTTP Headers (via webserver)

Malicious IIS w3wp Worker Spawning Command Interpreter via SharePoint Web Shell

Suspicious Single-Character Named Executable Launched by Web Server Process (via process_creation)

Malicious MOVEit human2.aspx Web Shell Dropped in wwwroot (via file_event)

Malicious IIS Worker Process Spawning PowerShell via Gladinet CentreStack Exploit

Exchange Worker Process Spawning Command Shell via OWASSRF

Malicious IIS Worker Process Spawning Command Shell via SharePoint ToolShell (via process_creation)

Pivot detection · T1190 · 9 related

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

Full detection rule

Unlock this rule to view and copy it

The detection logic is included with a plan. Everything else — context, mappings and implementation details — stays free on this page.

Sign in for 3 free unlocks

Signing in gives you 3 unlocks to spend on any rule in the library. No card, and they do not expire.

Also included

Unlocked rules convert on this page — to Splunk SPL or Splunk — Raw Index SPL or Microsoft Sentinel KQL or Microsoft Sentinel ASIM ASIM KQL or Microsoft Defender XDR KQL or Elastic Security KQL or Elastic Security Lucene or Elastic Security ES|QL or CrowdStrike Falcon CQL or SentinelOne PowerQuery or Palo Alto Cortex XDR XQL or Carbon Black Cloud Platform Search or Carbon Black EDR Process Search or Google Security Operations UDM Search or IBM QRadar AQL or Sumo Logic Cloud SIEM Rules expression or Rapid7 InsightIDR LEQL or Graylog Search or OpenSearch Lucene or OpenSearch PPL PPL or Grafana Loki LogQL or SQLite SQL or Zircolite SQLite — with the log-source profile the engine picked, the field map it used, and everything it could not express. Converting a rule you have unlocked costs no further credit.

See it run on a free rule →Convert your own rule →