T1110.003 Password Spraying Mappings

Adversaries may use a single or small list of commonly used passwords against many different accounts to attempt to acquire valid account credentials. Password spraying uses one password (e.g. 'Password01'), or a small list of commonly used passwords, that may match the complexity policy of the domain. Logins are attempted with that password against many different accounts on a network to avoid account lockouts that would normally occur when brute forcing a single account with many passwords. (Citation: BlackHillsInfosec Password Spraying)

Typically, management services over commonly used ports are used when password spraying. Commonly targeted services include the following:

  • SSH (22/TCP)
  • Telnet (23/TCP)
  • FTP (21/TCP)
  • NetBIOS / SMB / Samba (139/TCP & 445/TCP)
  • LDAP (389/TCP)
  • Kerberos (88/TCP)
  • RDP / Terminal Services (3389/TCP)
  • HTTP/HTTP Management Services (80/TCP & 443/TCP)
  • MSSQL (1433/TCP)
  • Oracle (1521/TCP)
  • MySQL (3306/TCP)
  • VNC (5900/TCP)

In addition to management services, adversaries may "target single sign-on (SSO) and cloud-based applications utilizing federated authentication protocols," as well as externally facing email applications, such as Office 365.(Citation: US-CERT TA18-068A 2018)

In default environments, LDAP and Kerberos connection attempts are less likely to trigger events over SMB, which creates Windows "logon failure" event ID 4625.

View in MITRE ATT&CK®

Mappings

Capability ID Capability Description Mapping Type ATT&CK ID ATT&CK Name
AC-2 Account Management Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
AC-20 Use of External Systems Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
AC-3 Access Enforcement Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
AC-5 Separation of Duties Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
AC-6 Least Privilege Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
AC-7 Unsuccessful Logon Attempts Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
CA-7 Continuous Monitoring Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
CM-2 Baseline Configuration Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
CM-6 Configuration Settings Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
IA-11 Re-authentication Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
IA-2 Identification and Authentication (organizational Users) Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
IA-4 Identifier Management Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
IA-5 Authenticator Management Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
SI-4 System Monitoring Protects T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_ad_identity_protection Azure AD Identity Protection technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_ad_identity_protection Azure AD Identity Protection technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
alerts_for_windows_machines Alerts for Windows Machines technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_security_center_recommendations Azure Security Center Recommendations technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
linux_auditd_alerts_and_log_analytics_agent_integration Linux auditd alerts and Log Analytics agent integration technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_sentinel Azure Sentinel technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
microsoft_defender_for_identity Microsoft Defender for Identity technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_ad_multi-factor_authentication Azure AD Multi-Factor Authentication technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_policy Azure Policy technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_alerts_for_network_layer Azure Alerts for Network Layer technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
advanced_threat_protection_for_azure_sql_database Advanced Threat Protection for Azure SQL Database technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
conditional_access Conditional Access technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
cloud_app_security_policies Cloud App Security Policies technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_ad_identity_secure_score Azure AD Identity Secure Score technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
azure_active_directory_password_protection Azure Active Directory Password Protection technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
just-in-time_vm_access Just-in-Time VM Access technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying
passwordless_authentication Passwordless Authentication technique_scores T1110.003 Password Spraying