Elastic Security Detection Rules

Excessive AWS S3 Object Encryption with SSE-C

Last updated 23 days ago on 2025-07-10
Created 7 months ago on 2025-01-15

About

Identifies a high-volume of AWS S3 objects stored in a bucket using using Server-Side Encryption with Customer-Provided Keys (SSE-C). Adversaries with compromised AWS credentials can encrypt objects in an S3 bucket using their own encryption keys, rendering the objects unreadable or recoverable without the key. This can be used as a form of ransomware to extort the bucket owner for the decryption key. This is a Threshold rule that triggers when this behavior is observed multiple times for a specific bucket in a short time-window.
Tags
Domain: CloudData Source: AWSData Source: Amazon Web ServicesData Source: AWS S3Use Case: Threat DetectionTactic: ImpactLanguage: kuery
Severity
high
Risk Score
73
MITRE ATT&CK™

Impact (TA0040)(opens in a new tab or window)

↳ Data Encrypted for Impact (T1486)(opens in a new tab or window)

False Positive Examples
Legitimate use of Server-Side Encryption with Customer-Provided Keys (SSE-C) to encrypt objects in an S3 bucket.
License
Elastic License v2(opens in a new tab or window)

Definition

Rule Type
Threshold Rule
Integration Pack
Prebuilt Security Detection Rules
Index Patterns
filebeat-*logs-aws.cloudtrail-*
Related Integrations

aws(opens in a new tab or window)

Query
event.dataset: "aws.cloudtrail"
    and event.provider: "s3.amazonaws.com"
    and event.action: "PutObject"
    and event.outcome: "success"
    and aws.cloudtrail.flattened.request_parameters.x-amz-server-side-encryption-customer-algorithm: "AES256"

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect Excessive AWS S3 Object Encryption with SSE-C 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).