Network Connection Initiated by Suspicious SSHD Child Process

Last updated 2 months ago on 2025-12-22
Created 2 years ago on 2024-06-06

About

This rule identifies an egress internet connection initiated by an SSH Daemon child process. This behavior is indicative of the alteration of a shell configuration file or other mechanism that launches a process when a new SSH login occurs. Attackers can also backdoor the SSH daemon to allow for persistence, call out to a C2 or to steal credentials.
Tags
Domain: EndpointOS: LinuxUse Case: Threat DetectionTactic: PersistenceData Source: Elastic DefendLanguage: eql
Severity
medium
Risk Score
47
MITRE ATT&CK™

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

Lateral Movement (TA0008)(external, opens in a new tab or window)

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

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.network*logs-endpoint.events.process*
Related Integrations

endpoint(external, opens in a new tab or window)

Query
text code block:
sequence by host.id with maxspan=1s [process where host.os.type == "linux" and event.type == "start" and event.action == "exec" and process.parent.executable == "/usr/sbin/sshd" and not process.command_line like ("*ansible*", "*BECOME-SUCCESS*")] by process.entity_id [network where host.os.type == "linux" and event.type == "start" and event.action == "connection_attempted" and ( process.executable like ( "/tmp/*", "/var/tmp/*", "/dev/shm/*", "./*", "/run/*", "/var/run/*", "/boot/*", "/sys/*", "/lost+found/*", "/proc/*", "/var/mail/*", "/var/www/*", "/home/*", "/root/*" ) or process.name like~ ( // Hidden processes ".*", // Suspicious file formats "*.elf", "*.sh", "*.py", "*.rb", "*.pl", "*.lua*", "*.php*", ".js", // Scheduled tasks "systemd", "cron", "crond", // Network utilities often used for reverse shells "nc", "netcat", "ncat", "telnet", "socat", "openssl", "nc.openbsd", "ngrok", "nc.traditional" ) ) and not ( destination.ip == null or destination.ip == "0.0.0.0" or cidrmatch( destination.ip, "10.0.0.0/8", "127.0.0.0/8", "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", "240.0.0.0/4", "::1", "FE80::/10", "FF00::/8", "172.31.0.0/16" ) or process.executable in ("/bin/yum", "/usr/bin/yum") or process.name in ("login_duo", "ssh", "sshd", "sshd-session", "sqlplus") ) ] by process.parent.entity_id

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect Network Connection Initiated by Suspicious SSHD Child Process 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).