Procedure examples

Cobalt Strike can leverage the HTTP protocol for C2 communication, while hiding the actual data in either an HTTP header, URI parameter, the transaction body, or appending it to the URI. Cobalt Strike has also added Host: ocsp.verisign.com to HTTP headers to mimic Online Certificate Status Protocol (OCSP) traffic.

Cobalt Strike can spawn a job to inject into LSASS memory and dump password hashes.

Cobalt Strike can recover hashed passwords.

Cobalt Strike can collect data from a local system.

Cobalt Strike can enumerate services on compromised hosts.

Cobalt Strike can query HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\<Excel Version>\Excel\Security\AccessVBOM\ to determine if the security setting for restricting default programmatic access is enabled.

Cobalt Strike can determine the NetBios name and the IP addresses of targets machines including domain controllers.

Cobalt Strike uses the native Windows Network Enumeration APIs to interrogate and discover targets in a Windows Active Directory network.

Cobalt Strike can start a VNC-based remote desktop server and tunnel the connection through the already established C2 channel.

Cobalt Strike can use Window admin shares (C$ and ADMIN$) for lateral movement.

Cobalt Strike can deliver Beacon payloads for lateral movement by leveraging remote COM execution.

Cobalt Strike can SSH to a remote service.

Cobalt Strike can use WinRM to execute a payload on a remote host.

Cobalt Strike can hash functions to obfuscate calls to the Windows API and use a public/private key pair to encrypt Beacon session metadata.

Cobalt Strike includes a capability to modify the Beacon payload to eliminate known signatures or unpacking methods.

Cobalt Strike can set its Beacon payload to reach out to the C2 server on an arbitrary and random interval.

Cobalt Strike will break large data sets into smaller chunks for exfiltration.

Cobalt Strike can perform port scans from an infected host.

Cobalt Strike can use WMI to deliver a payload to a remote host.

Cobalt Strike can produce a sessions report from compromised hosts.

Cobalt Strike can inject a variety of payloads into processes dynamically chosen by the adversary.

Cobalt Strike has the ability to load DLLs via reflective injection.

Cobalt Strike can use process hollowing for execution.

Cobalt Strike can track key presses with a keylogger module.

Cobalt Strike's Beacon payload can collect information on process details.

Cobalt Strike can execute a payload on a remote host with PowerShell. This technique does not write any data to disk. Cobalt Strike can also use PowerSploit and other scripting frameworks to perform execution.

Cobalt Strike uses a command-line interface to interact with systems.

Cobalt Strike can use VBA to perform execution.

Cobalt Strike can use Python to perform execution.

The Cobalt Strike System Profiler can use JavaScript to perform reconnaissance actions.

Cobalt Strike can exploit vulnerabilities such as MS14-058.

Cobalt Strike can use net localgroup to list local groups on a system.

Cobalt Strike can identify targets by querying account groups on a domain contoller.

Cobalt Strike can timestomp any files or payloads placed on a target machine to help them blend in.

Cobalt Strike can use a custom command and control protocol that can be encapsulated in HTTP or HTTPS. All protocols use their standard assigned ports.

Cobalt Strike can conduct peer-to-peer communication over Windows named pipes encapsulated in the SMB protocol. All protocols use their standard assigned ports.

Cobalt Strike can use a custom command and control protocol that can be encapsulated in DNS. All protocols use their standard assigned ports.

Cobalt Strike can use known credentials to run commands and spawn processes as a domain user account.

Cobalt Strike can use known credentials to run commands and spawn processes as a local user account.

Cobalt Strike can explore files on a compromised system.

Cobalt Strike can determine if the user on an infected machine is in the admin or domain admin group.

Cobalt Strike can be configured to have commands relayed over a peer-to-peer network of infected hosts. This can be used to limit the number of egress points, or provide access to a host without direct internet access.

Cobalt Strike has the ability to accept a value for HTTP Host Header to enable domain fronting.

Cobalt Strike can be configured to use TCP, ICMP, and UDP for C2 communications.

Cobalt Strike can deliver additional payloads to victim machines.

Cobalt Strike's Beacon payload is capable of running shell commands without cmd.exe and PowerShell commands without powershell.exe Cobalt Strike can also use `CreateThreadpoolWait`, `SetThreadpoolWait`, and `MessageBoxA` for sandbox evasion and execution of embedded payloads in memory.

Cobalt Strike can modify Registry values within HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\<Excel Version>\Excel\Security\AccessVBOM\ to enable the execution of additional code.

Cobalt Strike's Beacon payload is capable of capturing screenshots.

Cobalt Strike can use Base64, URL-safe Base64, or NetBIOS encoding in its C2 traffic.

Cobalt Strike can steal access tokens from exiting processes.