Suspicious Security Software Removal Batch Script Execution

ATT&CK techniques

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
Persistence
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects execution referencing batch scripts named to uninstall Sophos endpoint protection which Conti operators run to disable defenses before deploying ransomware. Observed in NCC Group research on Conti operations after the leaks using Removesophos and uninstallSophos batch files. Scripted removal of security tooling is a defense-evasion behavior that precedes impact.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1685 — drag to rearrange

Suspicious Silent Security Product Uninstaller Execution

Malicious Antivirus Removal via WMIC Product Uninstall

Malicious Defender Exclusion Added via Add-MpPreference (via process_creation)

Suspicious Microsoft Defender Exclusion Added for TEMP and PowerShell via Add-MpPreference

Suspicious ESXi execInstalledOnly Disabled via esxcli During Ransomware

Malicious Defender Tampering via Registry DisableRealtimeMonitoring

Suspicious SmartScreen Disable via Registry Modification via registry_set

Malicious Microsoft Defender Disable via Registry by Key Group

Suspicious Process Made Critical via RtlSetProcessIsCritical (via ps_script)

Suspicious Security Software Removal Batch Script Execution

Pivot detection · T1685 · 9 related

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

Full detection rule

Unlock this rule to view and copy it

The detection logic is included with a plan. Everything else — context, mappings and implementation details — stays free on this page.

Sign in for 3 free unlocks

Signing in gives you 3 unlocks to spend on any rule in the library. No card, and they do not expire.

Also included

Unlocked rules convert on this page — to Splunk SPL or Splunk — Raw Index SPL or Microsoft Sentinel KQL or Microsoft Sentinel ASIM ASIM KQL or Microsoft Defender XDR KQL or Elastic Security KQL or Elastic Security Lucene or Elastic Security ES|QL or CrowdStrike Falcon CQL or SentinelOne PowerQuery or Palo Alto Cortex XDR XQL or Carbon Black Cloud Platform Search or Carbon Black EDR Process Search or Google Security Operations UDM Search or IBM QRadar AQL or Sumo Logic Cloud SIEM Rules expression or Rapid7 InsightIDR LEQL or Graylog Search or OpenSearch Lucene or OpenSearch PPL PPL or Grafana Loki LogQL or SQLite SQL or Zircolite SQLite — with the log-source profile the engine picked, the field map it used, and everything it could not express. Converting a rule you have unlocked costs no further credit.

See it run on a free rule →Convert your own rule →