Suspicious Kubernetes Pod Deployment with Privileged or Host Namespace Flags

ATT&CK techniques

Execution → Defense Evasion

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
- T1610Deploy Container
Persistence
Priv Esc
- T1611Escape to Host
Defense Evasion
- T1610Deploy Container
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects on-the-fly creation of Kubernetes pods running tooling such as busybox or socat with privileged, host-PID or host-path options, a container-escape and pivot technique seen in real-world cluster attacks. Launching a privileged pod that mounts the node filesystem lets an attacker break out of the container onto the underlying host.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1611 — drag to rearrange

Suspicious Privileged or Host Namespace Kubernetes Pod Creation

Malicious Container Escape via Privileged Docker Host PID Namespace

Malicious Privileged Container Creation in Kubernetes (via audit)

Malicious Docker Socket Access via Curl Unix Socket

Suspicious Cgroup release_agent Abuse for Container Escape

Suspicious Privileged Docker Container Launch With Host chroot

Malicious Direct etcd Write to Kubernetes Registry via ETCDCTL_API (via process_creation)

Malicious Docker Client Targeting Remote Exposed 2375 API

Suspicious Shell Execution Into Kubernetes Pod via API

Suspicious Kubernetes Pod Deployment with Privileged or Host Namespace Flags

Pivot detection · T1611 · 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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