Suspicious SOAPHound Tautological LDAP Filter Enumeration

ATT&CK techniques

Discovery

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
Persistence
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
Cred Access
Discovery
- T1087.002Domain Account
- T1482Domain Trust Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects Directory Service event 1644 LDAP queries using the tautological filter (!(FALSE)) which matches every object, a signature of SOAPHound style collection that pulls the full directory in bulk. The always-true filter combined with the SD_FLAGS 0x7 control lets the tool harvest all objects and their security descriptors efficiently. A directory-wide (!(FALSE)) query is a strong indicator of automated Active Directory reconnaissance.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1087.002 — drag to rearrange

Windows File Events: ADExplorer .dat Snapshot Written by ADExp.exe or ADExplorer.exe

Windows: Sysinternals ADExplorer invoked with snapshot flag to create AD database snapshot

Windows Process Creation: Sysinternals ADExplorer Snapshot Exports Active Directory Database

Windows PowerShell module commandlet names matching known exploitation and post-exploitation tooling

Windows Process Creation: Suspicious PowerShell Commandlets Used by Known Exploitation Tools

Windows Process Creation: Renamed AdFind.exe Executions

Windows file creation for SharpHound/BloodHound collection output filenames

Windows LDAP Client Event ID 30 Active Directory enumeration via LDAP search filters

Windows Process Creation: AdFind Executed with Suspicious Recon Flags

Suspicious SOAPHound Tautological LDAP Filter Enumeration

Pivot detection · T1087.002 · 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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