Suspicious Timestomp via touch Reference Copy

ATT&CK techniques

Defense Evasion

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
Persistence
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
- T1070.006Timestomp
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule detects the touch command using the -r switch to copy timestamps from a reference file onto another file. Telecom network intruders timestomp their implants with touch -r so dropped files blend with legitimate system files. This behavior obscures the true creation time of attacker artifacts.

Reporting behind it

Related detections9 linkedT1070.006 — drag to rearrange

Suspicious Timestomp and Hidden Attribute Set on NTUSER Data File by EAGERBEE

Suspicious File Timestamp Manipulation via PowerShell (via process_creation)

Suspicious System Time Changed (via security)

Suspicious Timestomping of PHP Webshell in Ivanti CSA Webroot via touch (via process_creation)

Linux Service File Touch with Timestamp Argument

Windows File Creation Time Altered to a Previous Year

PowerShell timestomping via file timestamp property and setter usage (Windows)

macOS process using touch to modify file timestamps and hide file changes

Linux: Detect touch commands used to alter file timestamps with -t/-a/-c/-m/-r flags

Suspicious Timestomp via touch Reference Copy

Pivot detection · T1070.006 · 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 →