Regsvcs/Regasm

T1218.009

Sub-technique of T1218 System Binary Proxy Execution.View on attack.mitre.org

About this technique

Adversaries may abuse Regsvcs and Regasm to proxy execution of code through a trusted Windows utility. Regsvcs and Regasm are Windows command-line utilities that are used to register .NET Component Object Model (COM) assemblies. Both are binaries that may be digitally signed by Microsoft.

Both utilities may be used to bypass application control through use of attributes within the binary to specify code that should be run before registration or unregistration: [ComRegisterFunction] or [ComUnregisterFunction] respectively. The code with the registration and unregistration attributes will be executed even if the process is run under insufficient privileges and fails to execute.

Detection rules10

Rules on DetectionCode tagged with T1218.009.

Sigma4

Splunk6

RuleTypeRiskData source
Detect Regasm Spawning a ProcessTTPNULLSysmon EventID 1, Windows Event Log Security 4688, CrowdStrike ProcessRollup2
Detect Regasm with Network ConnectionTTPNULLSysmon EventID 3
Detect Regasm with no Command Line ArgumentsTTPNULLSysmon EventID 1, Windows Event Log Security 4688, CrowdStrike ProcessRollup2
Detect Regsvcs Spawning a ProcessTTPNULLSysmon EventID 1, Windows Event Log Security 4688, CrowdStrike ProcessRollup2
Detect Regsvcs with Network ConnectionTTPNULLSysmon EventID 3
Detect Regsvcs with No Command Line ArgumentsTTPNULLSysmon EventID 1, Windows Event Log Security 4688, CrowdStrike ProcessRollup2

Groups0

None recorded.

Software1

Campaigns0

None recorded.

Procedure examples1

Software1

Used byProcedure example
MalwareAgent Tesla

Agent Tesla has dropped RegAsm.exe onto systems for performing malicious activity.

References4

  1. LOLBAS Regasm Open source
    LOLBAS. (n.d.). Regasm.exe. Retrieved July 31, 2019.
  2. LOLBAS Regsvcs Open source
    LOLBAS. (n.d.). Regsvcs.exe. Retrieved July 31, 2019.
  3. MSDN Regasm Open source
    Microsoft. (n.d.). Regasm.exe (Assembly Registration Tool). Retrieved July 1, 2016.
  4. MSDN Regsvcs Open source
    Microsoft. (n.d.). Regsvcs.exe (.NET Services Installation Tool). Retrieved July 1, 2016.

Data from MITRE ATT&CK® (Enterprise). ATT&CK® is a registered trademark of The MITRE Corporation.