Possible Process Injection into Notepad via PythonRatLoader (via process_creation)

ATT&CK techniques

Execution → Defense Evasion

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
- T1059.006Python
Persistence
Priv Esc
- T1055.004Asynchronous Procedure Call
Defense Evasion
- T1055.004Asynchronous Procedure Call
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects notepad.exe being spawned by a Python interpreter, which corresponds to the PythonRatLoader chain that creates suspended notepad processes as hosts for Early Bird APC shellcode injection delivering DCRat, VenomRAT and XWorm. A Python process launching Notepad is highly abnormal on endpoints.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1059.006 — drag to rearrange

Malicious AI CLI Anti-Attribution and Permission Bypass Flags

Suspicious Python HTTP Server Staging for Payload Delivery

Suspicious Python Base64 Encoded Command Execution (via process_creation)

Suspicious __init__.py Drop in Public Directory by Slow Pisces (via file_event)

Malicious Python Reverse Shell One-Liner Execution (via process_creation)

Suspicious Silver Fox Backdoor Execution via pythonw appclient Module (via process_creation)

Suspicious Malicious MCP Package devtools-assistant Execution (via process_creation)

Malicious GitVenom Python Fernet Decrypt-and-Execute Loader via process_creation

Suspicious Python Executing Script from var root Library Caches on macOS (via process_creation)

Possible Process Injection into Notepad via PythonRatLoader (via process_creation)

Pivot detection · T1059.006 · 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 →