Suspicious AWS SES CreateEmailIdentity Following Key Compromise (Cloud Email Abuse)

ATT&CK techniques

Initial Access → Collection

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
- T1078.004Cloud Accounts
Execution
Persistence
- T1078.004Cloud Accounts
Priv Esc
- T1078.004Cloud Accounts
Defense Evasion
- T1078.004Cloud Accounts
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
- T1114Email Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects SES CreateEmailIdentity CloudTrail events that register new sending identities, an action the cloud email takeover campaign performed to stand up its phishing infrastructure. It matters because attackers with leaked keys create fresh verified identities to send mail that appears to originate from the victim tenant.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1078.004 — drag to rearrange

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Suspicious AWS API Activity From WinSCP Client User-Agent

Suspicious EKS Access Entry Creation via CloudTrail

Suspicious Azure CLI Service Principal Login with Inline Secret

Suspicious AWS Console Login Without MFA

Suspicious AWS SES CreateEmailIdentity Following Key Compromise (Cloud Email Abuse)

Pivot detection · T1078.004 · 9 related

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

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