---
title: "Office Spawning Control"
excerpt: "Phishing, Spearphishing Attachment"
categories:
  - Endpoint
last_modified_at: 2021-09-08
toc: true
toc_label: ""
tags:
  - Phishing
  - Initial Access
  - Spearphishing Attachment
  - Initial Access
  - Splunk Enterprise
  - Splunk Enterprise Security
  - Splunk Cloud
  - CVE-2021-40444
  - Endpoint
---



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#### Description

The following detection identifies control.exe spawning from an office product. This detection identifies any Windows Office Product spawning `control.exe`. In malicious instances, the command-line of `control.exe` will contain a file path to a .cpl or .inf, related to CVE-2021-40444. In this instance, we narrow our detection down to the Office suite as a parent process. During triage, review all file modifications. Capture and analyze any artifacts on disk. review parallel and child processes to identify further suspicious behavior

- **Type**: [TTP](https://github.com/splunk/security_content/wiki/Detection-Analytic-Types)
- **Product**: Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Enterprise Security, Splunk Cloud
- **Datamodel**: [Endpoint](https://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/CIM/latest/User/Endpoint)
- **Last Updated**: 2021-09-08
- **Author**: Michael Haag, Splunk
- **ID**: 053e027c-10c7-11ec-8437-acde48001122


#### [ATT&CK](https://attack.mitre.org/)

| ID             | Technique        |  Tactic             |
| -------------- | ---------------- |-------------------- |
| [T1566](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1566/) | Phishing | Initial Access |

| [T1566.001](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1566/001/) | Spearphishing Attachment | Initial Access |

#### Search

```

| tstats `security_content_summariesonly` count min(_time) as firstTime max(_time) as lastTime from datamodel=Endpoint.Processes where Processes.parent_process_name IN ("winword.exe","excel.exe","powerpnt.exe","mspub.exe","visio.exe","wordpad.exe","wordview.exe") Processes.process_name=control.exe by Processes.dest Processes.user Processes.parent_process Processes.process_name Processes.process Processes.process_id Processes.parent_process_id 
| `drop_dm_object_name(Processes)` 
| `security_content_ctime(firstTime)`
| `security_content_ctime(lastTime)`
| `office_spawning_control_filter`
```

#### Macros
The SPL above uses the following Macros:
* [security_content_ctime](https://github.com/splunk/security_content/blob/develop/macros/security_content_ctime.yml)
* [security_content_summariesonly](https://github.com/splunk/security_content/blob/develop/macros/security_content_summariesonly.yml)

Note that `office_spawning_control_filter` is a empty macro by default. It allows the user to filter out any results (false positives) without editing the SPL.

#### Required field
* Processes.dest
* Processes.user
* Processes.parent_process_name
* Processes.parent_process
* Processes.original_file_name
* Processes.process_name
* Processes.process
* Processes.process_id
* Processes.parent_process_path
* Processes.process_path
* Processes.parent_process_id


#### How To Implement
To successfully implement this search you need to be ingesting information on process that include the name of the process responsible for the changes from your endpoints into the `Endpoint` datamodel in the `Processes` node. In addition, confirm the latest CIM App 4.20 or higher is installed and the latest TA for the endpoint product.

#### Known False Positives
Limited false positives should be present.

#### Associated Analytic story
* [Spearphishing Attachments](/stories/spearphishing_attachments)
* [Microsoft MSHTML Remote Code Execution CVE-2021-40444](/stories/microsoft_mshtml_remote_code_execution_cve-2021-40444)


#### Kill Chain Phase
* Exploitation



#### RBA

| Risk Score  | Impact      | Confidence   | Message      |
| ----------- | ----------- |--------------|--------------|
| 80.0 | 80 | 100 | An instance of $parent_process_name$ spawning $process_name$ was identified on endpoint $dest$ clicking a suspicious attachment. |


Note that risk score is calculated base on the following formula: `(Impact * Confidence)/100`


#### CVE

| ID          | Summary | [CVSS](https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln-metrics/cvss) |
| ----------- | ----------- | -------------- |
| [CVE-2021-40444](https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-40444) | Microsoft MSHTML Remote Code Execution Vulnerability | 6.8 |



#### Reference

* [https://strontic.github.io/xcyclopedia/library/control.exe-1F13E714A0FEA8887707DFF49287996F.html](https://strontic.github.io/xcyclopedia/library/control.exe-1F13E714A0FEA8887707DFF49287996F.html)
* [https://app.any.run/tasks/36c14029-9df8-439c-bba0-45f2643b0c70/](https://app.any.run/tasks/36c14029-9df8-439c-bba0-45f2643b0c70/)
* [https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1218/011/](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1218/011/)
* [https://www.echotrail.io/insights/search/control.exe](https://www.echotrail.io/insights/search/control.exe)
* [https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-40444](https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-40444)
* [https://github.com/redcanaryco/atomic-red-team/blob/master/atomics/T1218.002/T1218.002.yaml](https://github.com/redcanaryco/atomic-red-team/blob/master/atomics/T1218.002/T1218.002.yaml)



#### Test Dataset
Replay any dataset to Splunk Enterprise by using our [`replay.py`](https://github.com/splunk/attack_data#using-replaypy) tool or the [UI](https://github.com/splunk/attack_data#using-ui).
Alternatively you can replay a dataset into a [Splunk Attack Range](https://github.com/splunk/attack_range#replay-dumps-into-attack-range-splunk-server)

* [https://media.githubusercontent.com/media/splunk/attack_data/master/datasets/attack_techniques/T1566.001/macro/windows-sysmon_control.log](https://media.githubusercontent.com/media/splunk/attack_data/master/datasets/attack_techniques/T1566.001/macro/windows-sysmon_control.log)



[*source*](https://github.com/splunk/security_content/tree/develop/detections/endpoint/office_spawning_control.yml) \| *version*: **1**