Suspicious PowerShell AMSI or ETW Tampering

ATT&CK techniques

Execution

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
- T1059.001PowerShell
Persistence
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects PowerShell script content that patches or disables the Antimalware Scan Interface (AMSI) or Event Tracing for Windows (ETW), a defense-evasion technique used to blind in-memory scanning and telemetry before executing malicious payloads. Such tampering is a hallmark of offensive tooling that seeks to run undetected in memory.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1059.001 — drag to rearrange

Suspicious In-Memory PowerShell Execution from Web Server via Automation Assembly (via image_load)

Suspicious Windows Defender Exclusion Added via PowerShell Add-MpPreference

Custom Cobalt Strike Command Execution

Malicious Windows Defender Real-Time Monitoring Disabled via PowerShell

Malicious AMSI Bypass via AmsiUtils amsiInitFailed Manipulation

Malicious PowerShell Download Cradle With DownloadString

Suspicious PowerShell Encoded Command Execution

Malicious ETW Disabling via COMPlus_ETWEnabled Environment Variable

Suspicious PowerShell Hidden Download Cradle via IEX

Suspicious PowerShell AMSI or ETW Tampering

Pivot detection · T1059.001 · 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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