Possible GTFOBins Shell Breakout via Unix Utilities

PremiumReviewedSigma · Medium · v1
Product
linux
Category
process_creation
Author
HuntRule
Published
2026-09-18
Updated
2026-09-18

ATT&CK techniques

Execution → Defense Evasion
  1. Recon

  2. Resource Dev

  3. Initial Access

  4. Persistence

  5. Cred Access

  6. Discovery

  7. Lateral Movement

  8. Collection

  9. C2

  10. Exfiltration

  11. Impact

What it detects

This rule detects common Unix utilities such as env, awk, busybox, and mysql spawning an interactive shell, a GTFOBins pattern used to break out of restricted environments or abuse sudo privileges. These utilities spawning /bin/sh or /bin/bash is atypical and indicates a shell-evasion attempt by an insider or intruder.

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Possible GTFOBins Shell Breakout via Unix Utilities
Pivot detection · T1059.004 · 9 related

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