Suspicious OpenSSH Reverse Tunnel Establishment via ssh.exe
- Product
- windows
- Category
- process_creation
- Author
- HuntRule
- Published
- 2026-08-21
- Updated
- 2026-08-28
ATT&CK techniques
C2Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
Persistence
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
Exfiltration
Impact
What it detects
This rule detects ssh.exe launched with the -R remote-forwarding switch to establish a reverse tunnel. In Talos IR ransomware engagements operators used OpenSSH reverse tunnels to proxy traffic back into the victim network for persistent access, so this is a protocol-tunneling indicator that should be correlated with the tunnel destination.
Reporting behind it
- blog.talosintelligence.comhttps://blog.talosintelligence.com/talos-ir-ransomware-engagements-and-the-significance-of-timeliness-in-incident-response/
- attack.mitre.orghttps://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1572/
- attack.mitre.orghttps://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1219/
- securelist.comhttps://securelist.com/tr/armored-likho-apt-with-busysnake-stealer/120292/
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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