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Every technique
T1505.003Detection written

Web Shell

PersistenceLinux, macOS, Network Devices, Windows

Where this stands

One published detection covers this technique. Every one is unverified — no rule on Siemphony has been executed against real telemetry.

What the technique is

Adversaries may backdoor web servers with web shells to establish persistent access to systems. A Web shell is a Web script that is placed on an openly accessible Web server to allow an adversary to access the Web server as a gateway into a network. A Web shell may provide a set of functions to execute or a command-line interface on the system that hosts the Web server. In addition to a server-side script, a Web shell may have a client interface program that is used to talk to the Web server (e.g. China Chopper Web shell client).

Read it on attack.mitre.org

What MITRE says you would watch

  • AN1108

    Unexpected file creation in web directories followed by web server processes (e.g., w3wp.exe) spawning command shells or script interpreters (e.g., cmd.exe, powershell.exe)

  • AN1109

    File creation of unauthorized script (e.g.,.php,.sh) in /var/www/html followed by execution of unexpected system utilities (e.g., curl, bash, nc) by apache/nginx

  • AN1110

    Web servers (e.g., httpd) spawning abnormal processes post file upload into /Library/WebServer/Documents or /usr/local/var/www

Technique names and descriptions © MITRE ATT&CK®, CC BY 4.0. Not endorsed by MITRE.