File System Debugger Launched Inside a Container

Last updated 5 months ago on 2025-03-12
Created 5 months ago on 2025-03-12

About

This rule detects the use of the built-in Linux DebugFS utility from inside a container. DebugFS is a special file system debugging utility which supports reading and writing directly from a hard drive device. When launched inside a privileged container, a container deployed with all the capabilities of the host machine, an attacker can access sensitive host level files which could be used for further privilege escalation and container escapes to the host machine.
Tags
Domain: ContainerOS: LinuxUse Case: Threat DetectionTactic: Privilege EscalationData Source: Elastic DefendLanguage: eql
Severity
medium
Risk Score
47
MITRE ATT&CK™

Privilege Escalation (TA0004)(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.process*
Related Integrations

endpoint(opens in a new tab or window)

Query
process where host.os.type == "linux" and event.type == "start" and event.action == "exec" and
process.entry_leader.entry_meta.type == "container" and process.name == "debugfs" and
process.command_line like~ "/dev/sd*" and not process.args == "-R"

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect File System Debugger Launched Inside a Container 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).