Malicious LOLBin Spawned by Outlook via MonikerLink CVE-2024-21413

ATT&CK techniques

Initial Access → Defense Evasion

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
- T1566.002Spearphishing Link
Execution
Persistence
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
- T1218.005Mshta
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects Microsoft Outlook spawning script interpreters or living off the land binaries such as mshta which is a hallmark of the MonikerLink CVE-2024-21413 exploitation chain. Successful exploitation lets an attacker bypass the Protected View warning and achieve code execution from a crafted email which makes any such child process highly suspicious.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1218.005 — drag to rearrange

Suspicious MSHTA VBScript WScript Shell Execution

Suspicious Remote HTA Payload Execution via MSHTA

Malicious Shell Spawned by Mshta Delivery (via process_creation)

Malicious Kimsuky Remote HTA Execution via URL Shortener (via process_creation)

ClickFix Paste-Jacking Execution of mshta Retrieving Remote Payload (via process_creation)

Suspicious mshta Execution of Remote HTA Payload

Suspicious Mshta Executed From Non-System Path (via process_creation)

Malicious Forfiles Proxy Execution Launching PowerShell and MSHTA in PEAKLIGHT Chain (via process_creation)

Suspicious Phishing URL with Unrendered Template Placeholder (via proxy)

Malicious LOLBin Spawned by Outlook via MonikerLink CVE-2024-21413

Pivot detection · T1218.005 · 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 →