Elastic Security Detection Rules

Container Management Utility Run Inside A Container

Last updated 7 months ago on 2025-06-17
Created 10 months ago on 2025-03-12

About

This rule detects when a container management binary is run from inside a container. These binaries are critical components of many containerized environments, and their presence and execution in unauthorized containers could indicate compromise or a misconfiguration.
Tags
Domain: ContainerOS: LinuxUse Case: Threat DetectionTactic: ExecutionData Source: Elastic DefendLanguage: eql
Severity
low
Risk Score
21
MITRE ATT&CK™

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

↳ Container Administration Command (T1609)(external, opens in a new tab or window)

False Positive Examples
There is a potential for false positives if the container is used for legitimate administrative tasks that require the use of container management utilities, such as deploying, scaling, or updating containerized applications. It is important to investigate any alerts generated by this rule to determine if they are indicative of malicious activity or part of legitimate container activity.
License
Elastic License v2(external, 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(external, opens in a new tab or window)

Query
text code block:
process where host.os.type == "linux" and event.type == "start" and event.action == "exec" and
process.entry_leader.entry_meta.type == "container" and process.interactive == true and
process.name in ("dockerd", "docker", "kubelet", "kube-proxy", "kubectl", "containerd", "systemd", "crictl") and
not process.parent.executable in ("/sbin/init", "/usr/bin/dockerd")

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect Container Management Utility Run 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(external, opens in a new tab or window).