huntrule

Suspicious PowerShell Self-Delete Of Executable via Process Creation

PremiumReviewedSigma · Medium · v1
Product
windows
Category
process_creation
Author
HuntRule
Published
2026-06-07
Updated
2026-08-28
AnalysisDetection

ATT&CK techniques

Defense Evasion

  1. Recon

  2. Resource Dev

  3. Initial Access

  4. Execution

  5. Persistence

  6. Priv Esc

  7. Defense Evasion

  8. Cred Access

  9. Discovery

  10. Lateral Movement

  11. Collection

  12. C2

  13. Exfiltration

  14. Impact

What it detects

This rule detects PowerShell used to delete an executable in a wait-and-retry loop. Rhysida ransomware removes its own binary after execution using a PowerShell routine that loops on Test-Path and Start-Sleep until the file is gone, eliminating forensic artifacts.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1070.004 — drag to rearrange
Suspicious Crontab Removal via Command Line (via process_creation)
Suspicious Self-Deletion via Ping Loopback and Del (via process_creation)
Malicious Self-Deletion Via Fsutil SetZeroData
Self-Deletion via Ping Loopback Delay and Del Command
Suspicious Deletion of Explorer RunMRU Values
Suspicious Prefetch Deletion for Anti-Forensics
Malicious Ransomware Self-Deletion via Ping Loopback and Del
Suspicious Self-Deletion Batch Artifact by JadeProx TriBack Loader (via file_event)
Windows: Zone.Identifier Alternate Data Stream Deleted by Uncommon Application
Suspicious PowerShell Self-Delete Of Executable via Process Creation
Pivot detection · T1070.004 · 9 related

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