Windows System Service Execution of Credential Dumping Tools (Service Control Manager Event 7045)
Flags Service Control Manager service creation with ImagePath names tied to credential dumping tools (Event ID 7045).
- Product
- windows
- Service
- system
- Author
- Florian Roth (Nextron Systems), Teymur Kheirkhabarov, Daniil Yugoslavskiy, oscd.community (SigmaHQ), DRL 1.1
- Published
- 2017-03-05
- Updated
- 2026-07-31
ATT&CK techniques
Execution → Cred AccessRecon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
Persistence
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact
What it detects
This rule flags Windows service creation/execution events from the Service Control Manager where the service image path contains known credential dumping tool names (e.g., cachedump, pwdump, mimidrv). Attackers commonly use these tools to extract credentials, and running them as services can provide reliable execution and persistence within the Windows environment. It relies on telemetry for Service Control Manager events (EventID 7045) including the service image path for matching tool substrings.
Reporting behind it
Changelog
v2- v2Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
- v1No changelog recorded for this version.2026-07-30
Detection content is published as a reviewed draft. Tune thresholds and exclusions against your own telemetry before enabling this rule for alerting.
title: Windows System Service Execution of Credential Dumping Tools (Service Control Manager Event 7045)
id: c29d728e-5675-4db6-92a0-7276fde053c5
status: test
description: This rule flags Windows service creation/execution events from the Service Control Manager where the service image path contains known credential dumping tool names (e.g., cachedump, pwdump, mimidrv). Attackers commonly use these tools to extract credentials, and running them as services can provide reliable execution and persistence within the Windows environment. It relies on telemetry for Service Control Manager events (EventID 7045) including the service image path for matching tool substrings.
references:
- https://www.slideshare.net/heirhabarov/hunting-for-credentials-dumping-in-windows-environment
- https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/master/rules/windows/builtin/system/service_control_manager/win_system_mal_creddumper.yml
author: Florian Roth (Nextron Systems), Teymur Kheirkhabarov, Daniil Yugoslavskiy, oscd.community, Huntrule Team
date: 2017-03-05
modified: 2022-11-29
tags:
- attack.credential-access
- attack.execution
- attack.t1003.001
- attack.t1003.002
- attack.t1003.004
- attack.t1003.005
- attack.t1003.006
- attack.t1569.002
- attack.s0005
logsource:
product: windows
service: system
detection:
selection:
Provider_Name: Service Control Manager
EventID: 7045
ImagePath|contains:
- cachedump
- dumpsvc
- fgexec
- gsecdump
- mimidrv
- pwdump
- servpw
condition: selection
falsepositives:
- Legitimate Administrator using credential dumping tool for password recovery
level: high
license: DRL-1.1
related:
- id: 4976aa50-8f41-45c6-8b15-ab3fc10e79ed
type: derived