Suspicious Network Scanning Tool Execution

PremiumReviewedSigma · Medium · v1
Product
windows
Category
process_creation
Author
HuntRule
Published
2026-08-24
Updated
2026-08-28

ATT&CK techniques

Discovery
  1. Recon

  2. Resource Dev

  3. Initial Access

  4. Execution

  5. Persistence

  6. Priv Esc

  7. Defense Evasion

  8. Cred Access

  9. Lateral Movement

  10. Collection

  11. C2

  12. Exfiltration

  13. Impact

What it detects

This rule detects execution of network and port scanning utilities such as SoftPerfect Netscan and Advanced Port or IP Scanner that were used for internal reconnaissance as described in NCC Group Fivehands ransomware research. Adversaries run these scanners after initial access to map reachable hosts and services before lateral movement so their presence on servers or non administrator hosts is suspicious.

Related detections9 linkedT1046 — drag to rearrange
Suspicious Advanced IP Scanner Execution for Network Discovery
Suspicious masscan Scanning Docker API Port 2375
Suspicious Network Reconnaissance via Advanced Port Scanner
Suspicious Nmap Scanner Probe URIs in HTTP Requests (via webserver)
Suspicious Internet Scanning for Docker and Kubelet Ports via masscan
Suspicious Fscan Internal Network Scanner Execution (via process_creation)
Possible Network Service Scanning via Nmap or Masscan (via process_creation)
Malicious Anonymous Login - Domain Specified (via security)
Malicious RDP Discovery Performed on Multiple Hosts (via rdp)
Suspicious Network Scanning Tool Execution
Pivot detection · T1046 · 9 related

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