Uncommon Destination Port Connection by Web Server

Last updated 4 months ago on 2025-04-07
Created 5 months ago on 2025-03-05

About

This rule identifies unusual destination port network activity originating from a web server process. The rule is designed to detect potential web shell activity or unauthorized communication from a web server process to external systems.
Tags
Domain: EndpointOS: LinuxUse Case: Threat DetectionTactic: PersistenceTactic: ExecutionTactic: Command and ControlData Source: Elastic DefendLanguage: eql
Severity
low
Risk Score
21
MITRE ATT&CK™

Persistence (TA0003)(opens in a new tab or window)

Execution (TA0002)(opens in a new tab or window)

Command and Control (TA0011)(opens in a new tab or window)

License
Elastic License v2(opens in a new tab or window)

Definition

Rule Type
Event Correlation Rule
Integration Pack
Prebuilt Security Detection Rules
Index Patterns
logs-endpoint.events.network*
Related Integrations

endpoint(opens in a new tab or window)

Query
network where host.os.type == "linux" and event.type == "start" and event.action == "connection_attempted" and (
     user.name in (
      "apache", "www-data", "httpd", "nginx", "lighttpd", "tomcat", "tomcat8", "tomcat9", "ftp", "ftpuser", "ftpd"
     ) or
     user.id in ("99", "33", "498", "48")
   ) and (
   process.name in (
    "apache", "nginx", "apache2", "httpd", "lighttpd", "caddy", "node", "mongrel_rails", "java", "gunicorn",
    "uwsgi", "openresty", "cherokee", "h2o", "resin", "puma", "unicorn", "traefik", "tornado", "hypercorn",
    "daphne", "twistd", "yaws", "webfsd", "httpd.worker", "flask", "rails", "mongrel"
  ) or
    process.name like ("php-*", "python*", "ruby*", "perl*")
) and
network.direction == "egress" and destination.ip != null and
not destination.port in (80, 443, 8080, 8443, 8000, 8888, 3128, 3306) and
not cidrmatch(destination.ip, "127.0.0.0/8", "::1","FE80::/10", "FF00::/8")

/* 
This rule does not exclude local IP ranges by default. To exclude these, use the following exclusion statement:
cidrmatch(destination.ip, "10.0.0.0/8", "169.254.0.0/16", "172.16.0.0/12", "192.0.0.0/24", "192.0.0.0/29", "192.0.0.8/32", "192.0.0.9/32",
"192.0.0.10/32", "192.0.0.170/32", "192.0.0.171/32", "192.0.2.0/24", "192.31.196.0/24", "192.52.193.0/24", "192.168.0.0/16", "192.88.99.0/24",
"224.0.0.0/4", "100.64.0.0/10", "192.175.48.0/24","198.18.0.0/15", "198.51.100.0/24", "203.0.113.0/24", "224.0.0.0/4", "240.0.0.0/4")
*/

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect Uncommon Destination Port Connection by Web Server in the Elastic Security detection engine by installing this rule into your Elastic Stack.

To setup this rule, check out the installation guide for Prebuilt Security Detection Rules(opens in a new tab or window).