Adversaries may clear or remove evidence of malicious network connections in order to clean up traces of their operations. Configuration settings as well as various artifacts that highlight connection history may be created on a system and/or in application logs from behaviors that require network connections, such as Remote Services or External Remote Services. Defenders may use these artifacts to monitor or otherwise analyze network connections created by adversaries.
Network connection history may be stored in various locations. For example, RDP connection history may be stored in Windows Registry values under (Citation: Microsoft RDP Removal):
Windows may also store information about recent RDP connections in files such as <code>C:\Users\%username%\Documents\Default.rdp</code> and C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Terminal
Server Client\Cache\.(Citation: Moran RDPieces) Similarly, macOS and Linux hosts may store information highlighting connection history in system logs (such as those stored in /Library/Logs and/or /var/log/).(Citation: Apple Culprit Access)(Citation: FreeDesktop Journal)(Citation: Apple Unified Log Analysis Remote Login and Screen Sharing)
Malicious network connections may also require changes to third-party applications or network configuration settings, such as Disable or Modify System Firewall or tampering to enable Proxy. Adversaries may delete or modify this data to conceal indicators and/or impede defensive analysis.
View in MITRE ATT&CK®| Capability ID | Capability Description | Mapping Type | ATT&CK ID | ATT&CK Name | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| amazon_inspector | Amazon Inspector | technique_scores | T1070.007 | Clear Network Connection History and Configurations |
Comments
The Amazon Inspector Best Practices assessment package can assess security control "Configure permissions for system directories" that prevents privilege escalation by local users and ensures only the root account can modify/execute system configuration information and binaries. Amazon Inspector does not directly protect against system modifications rather it just checks to see if security controls are in place which can inform decisions around hardening the system. Due to this and the fact the security control is only supported for Linux platforms, the score is Minimal.
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