tool

Empire S0363

Type: tool
Platforms: Linux, macOS, Windows
Created: 11 March 2019
Last modified: 24 October 2025

Empire is an open-source, cross-platform remote administration and post-exploitation framework that is publicly available on GitHub. While the tool itself is primarily written in Python, the post-exploitation agents are written in pure PowerShell for Windows and Python for Linux/macOS. Empire was one of five tools singled out by a joint report on public hacking tools being widely used by adversaries.[1][2][3]

TechniquesTop 1%

TacticsTop 2%

Threat groupsunranked

Campaignunranked

Enterprise ATT&CK only. Any Mobile or ICS rows on the same ATT&CK page are not carried.

Select	Description	Category	Status	Event	OS	Product	MITRE ATT&CK	CVEs	Severity	Author	Created	Updated	ID
	Detects potential DLL sideloading of DLLs that are known to be abused from suspicious locations	Generic	test	image_load	windows	Sysmon	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter	-	high	X__Junior (Nextron Systems)	2023-07-11	—	799a5f48-0ac1-4e0f-9152-71d137d48c2a
Splunk	The following analytic detects attempts to dump the LSASS process memory, a common technique in credential dumping attacks. (...)	Generic	stable	process_access	windows	Sysmon	Credential Access OS Credential Dumping LSASS Memory	-	medium	Patrick Bareiss, Splunk	2019-12-11	2026-10-09	fb4c31b0-13e8-4155-8aa5-24de4b8d6717
	Detects file access requests to browser credential stores by uncommon processes. (...)	Hunting	test	file_event	windows	WinEventLog Security	Credential Access Credentials from Password Stores Credentials from Web Browsers	-	low	Daniel Koifman (@Koifsec), Nasreddine Bencherchali	2024-10-21	—	4b60e527-ec73-4b47-8cb3-f02ad927ca65
	Adversaries may acquire credentials from web browsers by reading files specific to the target browser. (...)	Generic	test	ps_script	windows	PowerShell	Credential Access Credentials from Password Stores Credentials from Web Browsers	-	medium	frack113	2022-01-30	—	fc028194-969d-4122-8abe-0470d5b8f12f
	Detects usage of the "Get-AdComputer" to enumerate Computers or properties within Active Directory.	Generic	test	ps_script	windows	PowerShell	Discovery Account Discovery Domain Account Discovery Remote System Discovery	-	low	frack113	2022-03-17	2023-07-08	36bed6b2-e9a0-4fff-beeb-413a92b86138
	Detects the execution of Sysinternals ADExplorer with the "-snapshot" flag in order to save a local copy of the active directory database. (...)	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Discovery Account Discovery Domain Account Discovery Domain Trust Discovery Discovery Permission Groups Discovery Domain Groups	-	medium	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-03-14	2025-07-09	9212f354-7775-4e28-9c9f-8f0a4544e664
Splunk	The following analytic identifies potential lateral movement activities within an organization's Active Directory (AD) environment. (...)	Correlation	stable	-	-	-	Lateral Movement Exploitation of Remote Services	-	medium	Michael Haag, Splunk	2023-04-19	2026-05-13	6aa6f9dd-adfe-45a8-8f74-c4c7a0d7d037
	Detects the execution of "csvde.exe" in order to export organizational Active Directory structure.	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Discovery Account Discovery Domain Account	-	medium	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-03-14	—	e5d36acd-acb4-4c6f-a13f-9eb203d50099
	Detect priv users or groups recon based on 4661 eventid and known privileged users or groups SIDs	Generic	test	-	windows	WinEventLog Security	Discovery Account Discovery Domain Account	-	high	Samir Bousseaden	2019-04-03	2022-07-13	35ba1d85-724d-42a3-889f-2e2362bcaf23
	Detects the creation of a machine account whose name starts with 'GHOST', which is the naming conven (...)	Emerging	experimental	account_management	windows	WinEventLog Security	Persistence Create Account Domain Account Credential Access Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates	CVE-2026-54121	high	Swachchhanda Shrawan Poudel (Nextron Systems)	2026-07-30	—	fa0bac5f-d170-4a91-9780-1ad71dc1f49e
	Detects usage of winget to add a new insecure (http) download source. (...)	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter	-	high	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-04-17	—	81a0ecb5-0a41-4ba1-b2ba-c944eb92bfa2
	Detects usage of winget to add new additional download sources	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter	-	medium	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-04-17	—	05ebafc8-7aa2-4bcd-a269-2aec93f9e842
	Detects usage of winget to add new potentially suspicious download sources	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter	-	medium	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-04-17	2023-12-04	c15a46a0-07d4-4c87-b4b6-89207835a83b
	An attacker can use the SID history attribute to gain additional privileges.	Generic	stable	-	windows	WinEventLog Security	Privilege Escalation, Stealth Access Token Manipulation SID-History Injection	-	medium	Thomas Patzke, @atc_project (improvements)	2017-02-19	—	2632954e-db1c-49cb-9936-67d1ef1d17d2
	Detects the dual use tool ADExplorer writing a complete AD snapshot into a .dat file. (...)	Generic	experimental	file_event	windows	Sysmon	Discovery Account Discovery Domain Account Discovery Domain Trust Discovery Discovery Permission Groups Discovery Domain Groups	-	medium	Arnim Rupp (Nextron Systems), Thomas Patzke	2025-07-09	—	0a1255c5-d732-4b62-ac02-b5152d34fb83
Splunk	The following analytic detects the use of the `[Adsisearcher]` type accelerator in PowerShell to query Active Directory for domain users. (...)	Generic	stable	ps_script	windows	PowerShell	Discovery Account Discovery Domain Account	-	medium	Teoderick Contreras, Mauricio Velazco, Splunk	2021-08-25	2026-10-02	de7fcadc-04f3-11ec-a241-acde48001122
Splunk	The following analytic detects the execution of network scanning utilities such as Advanced IP Scanner or Advanced Port Scanner. (...)	Anomaly	stable	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security · CrowdStrike	Discovery Network Service Discovery Discovery Network Share Discovery	-	medium	Nasreddine Bencherchali, Splunk	2025-10-24	2026-05-13	9a4e50c7-5b62-4d52-93b4-f2b61332e9a5
	Detects the use of Advanced IP Scanner. (...)	Generic	test	file_event	windows	Sysmon	Discovery Network Service Discovery	-	medium	@ROxPinTeddy	2020-05-12	2022-11-29	fed85bf9-e075-4280-9159-fbe8a023d6fa
	Detects suspicious DACL modifications to allow access to a service from a suspicious trustee. (...)	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Persistence, Privilege Escalation Create or Modify System Process Windows Service	-	high	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-02-28	2025-10-22	6c8fbee5-dee8-49bc-851d-c3142d02aa47
	Detects alternate PowerShell hosts potentially bypassing detections looking for powershell.exe	Generic	test	ps_module	windows	PowerShell	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter PowerShell	-	medium	Roberto Rodriguez @Cyb3rWard0g	2019-08-11	2025-10-17	64e8e417-c19a-475a-8d19-98ea705394cc
	Detects alternate PowerShell hosts potentially bypassing detections looking for powershell.exe	Generic	test	pipe_created	windows	Sysmon	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter PowerShell	-	medium	Roberto Rodriguez @Cyb3rWard0g, Tim Shelton	2019-09-12	2025-10-07	58cb02d5-78ce-4692-b3e1-dce850aae41a
	Detects Windows Installer service (msiexec.exe) spawning "cmd" or "powershell"	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Privilege Escalation Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism Bypass User Account Control	-	medium	Teymur Kheirkhabarov (idea), Mangatas Tondang (rule), oscd.community	2020-10-13	2022-10-20	1e53dd56-8d83-4eb4-a43e-b790a05510aa
	This rule will looks any process with low privilege launching Windows Installer service (msiexec.exe (...)	Unsupported	unsupported	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Privilege Escalation Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism Bypass User Account Control	-	high	Teymur Kheirkhabarov (idea), Mangatas Tondang (rule), oscd.community	2020-10-13	—	078235c5-6ec5-48e7-94b2-f8b5474379ea
	Detects Windows Installer service (msiexec.exe) trying to install MSI packages with SYSTEM privilege	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Privilege Escalation Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism Bypass User Account Control	-	medium	Teymur Kheirkhabarov (idea), Mangatas Tondang (rule), oscd.community	2020-10-13	2024-12-01	cd951fdc-4b2f-47f5-ba99-a33bf61e3770
	Detects a highly relevant Antivirus alert that reports password dumpers and stealers. (...)	Generic	stable	antivirus	-	-	Credential Access OS Credential Dumping LSASS Memory Security Account Manager Credential Access Steal or Forge Kerberos Tickets	-	critical	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems), Arnim Rupp	2018-09-09	2026-06-15	78cc2dd2-7d20-4d32-93ff-057084c38b93
	Detects the suspicious file that is created from PoC code against Windows Print Spooler Remote Code Execution Vulnerability CVE-2021-34527 (PrinterNightmare), CVE-2021-1675 .	Emerging	stable	antivirus	-	-	Privilege Escalation, Stealth Process Injection	CVE-2021-1675 CVE-2021-34527	critical	Sittikorn S, Nuttakorn T, Tim Shelton	2021-07-01	2023-10-23	6fe1719e-ecdf-4caf-bffe-4f501cb0a561
	Detects an issue in apache logs that reports threading related errors	Generic	test	-	-	Apache	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application Lateral Movement Exploitation of Remote Services	-	medium	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems)	2019-01-22	2021-11-27	e9a2b582-3f6a-48ac-b4a1-6849cdc50b3c
	Detects the removal or uninstallation of an application via "Wmic.EXE".	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Execution Windows Management Instrumentation	-	medium	frack113	2022-01-28	2024-07-02	b53317a0-8acf-4fd1-8de8-a5401e776b96
	Detects an attempt to terminate a process via "wmic" with the "call terminate" flag. (...)	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Execution Windows Management Instrumentation	-	medium	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-09-11	—	49d9671b-0a0a-4c09-8280-d215bfd30662
	Detects when AppLocker "Audit only" enforcement mode reports that an Application, DLL, Script, MSI, or Packaged-App would have been blocked if AppLocker "Enforce rules" enforcement mode was enabled.	Generic	experimental	-	windows	AppLocker	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter PowerShell Windows Command Shell Visual Basic Python Execution User Execution Malicious File	-	medium	heyyanu	2026-03-26	—	557e3bd3-7f21-495d-8d50-7c8bdfb8041c
	Detects when AppLocker prevents the execution of an Application, DLL, Script, MSI, or Packaged-App from running.	Generic	test	-	windows	AppLocker	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter PowerShell Windows Command Shell Visual Basic Python Execution User Execution Malicious File	-	medium	Pushkarev Dmitry	2020-06-28	2025-12-03	401e5d00-b944-11ea-8f9a-00163ecd60ae
	Detects DNS queries made by "AppInstaller.EXE". (...)	Generic	test	dns	windows	Sysmon	Command and Control Ingress Tool Transfer	-	medium	frack113	2021-11-24	2023-11-09	7cff77e1-9663-46a3-8260-17f2e1aa9d0a
	Detects an image load pattern as seen when a tool named PRIVATELOG is used and rarely observed under (...)	Emerging	test	image_load	windows	Sysmon	Privilege Escalation, Stealth Process Injection	-	high	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems)	2021-09-07	2022-10-09	33a2d1dd-f3b0-40bd-8baf-7974468927cc
	Detects suspicious user agent strings used in APT malware in proxy logs	Generic	test	proxy	-	-	Command and Control Application Layer Protocol Web Protocols	-	high	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems), Markus Neis	2019-11-12	2024-02-15	6ec820f2-e963-4801-9127-d8b2dce4d31b
	Detects the execution of DLL side-loading malware used by threat group Emissary Panda aka APT27	Emerging	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Execution, Stealth Hijack Execution Flow DLL	-	critical	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems)	2018-09-03	2023-03-09	9aa01d62-7667-4d3b-acb8-8cb5103e2014
	This method detects malicious services mentioned in APT29 report by FireEye. (...)	Unsupported	unsupported	process_creation	windows	WinEventLog System	Persistence, Privilege Escalation Create or Modify System Process Windows Service	-	high	Thomas Patzke	2017-11-01	2022-03-21	c069f460-2b87-4010-8dcf-e45bab362624
	Detects APT31 Judgement Panda activity as described in the Crowdstrike 2019 Global Threat Report	Emerging	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Collection Archive Collected Data Archive via Utility Credential Access OS Credential Dumping LSASS Memory	-	critical	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems)	2019-02-21	2023-03-10	03e2746e-2b31-42f1-ab7a-eb39365b2422
	Detects suspicious user agent string of APT40 Dropbox tool	Emerging	test	proxy	-	-	Command and Control Application Layer Protocol Web Protocols Exfiltration Exfiltration Over Web Service Exfiltration to Cloud Storage	-	high	Thomas Patzke	2019-11-12	2023-05-18	5ba715b6-71b7-44fd-8245-f66893e81b3d
	Detects execution of GfxDownloadWrapper.exe with a URL as an argument to download file.	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Command and Control Ingress Tool Transfer	-	medium	Victor Sergeev, oscd.community	2020-10-09	2023-10-18	eee00933-a761-4cd0-be70-c42fe91731e7
	Detects potential DLL sideloading activity via the Aruba Networks Virtual Intranet Access "arubanets (...)	Generic	test	image_load	windows	Sysmon	Execution, Stealth Hijack Execution Flow DLL	-	high	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-01-22	2023-03-15	90ae0469-0cee-4509-b67f-e5efcef040f7
	Detects spawning of suspicious child processes by Atlassian Confluence server which may indicate suc (...)	Emerging	test	process_creation	linux	Sysmon	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2022-26134	high	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2022-06-03	—	7fb14105-530e-4e2e-8cfb-99f7d8700b66
	Detects the presence of "UWhRC....AAYBAAAA" pattern in command line. (...)	Generic	experimental	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Credential Access, Collection Adversary-in-the-Middle Name Resolution Poisoning and SMB Relay Credential Access Forced Authentication	CVE-2025-33073	high	Swachchhanda Shrawan Poudel (Nextron Systems)	2025-06-20	—	0ed99dda-6a35-11ef-8c99-0242ac120002
	Detects events generated by user-mode applications when they call the CveEventWrite API when a known vulnerability is trying to be exploited. (...)	Generic	test	-	windows	WinEventLog Application	Impact Endpoint Denial of Service Application or System Exploitation Execution Exploitation for Client Execution Credential Access Exploitation for Credential Access Privilege Escalation Exploitation for Privilege Escalation Stealth Exploitation for Stealth Lateral Movement Exploitation of Remote Services	CVE-2020-0601	critical	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems), Zach Mathis	2020-01-15	2022-10-22	48d91a3a-2363-43ba-a456-ca71ac3da5c2
	Detects kernel auto-loading of the authencesn crypto module via modprobe This occurs when user-space (...)	Emerging	experimental	process_creation	linux	Sysmon	Persistence, Privilege Escalation Boot or Logon Autostart Execution Kernel Modules and Extensions Privilege Escalation Exploitation for Privilege Escalation	CVE-2026-31431	high	Gene Kazimiarovich	2026-05-09	—	474b415a-d917-4f3b-8c62-9e1a0d5f7b48
	Adversaries may enumerate browser bookmarks to learn more about compromised hosts. (...)	Generic	test	ps_script	windows	PowerShell	Discovery Browser Information Discovery	-	low	frack113	2021-12-13	2022-12-25	e0565f5d-d420-4e02-8a68-ac00d864f9cf
	Once established within a system or network, an adversary may use automated techniques for collecting internal data.	Generic	test	ps_script	windows	PowerShell	Collection Automated Collection	-	medium	frack113	2021-07-28	2022-12-25	c1dda054-d638-4c16-afc8-53e007f3fbc5
	Once established within a system or network, an adversary may use automated techniques for collecting internal data.	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Collection Automated Collection Credential Access Unsecured Credentials Credentials In Files	-	medium	frack113	2021-07-28	2022-11-11	f576a613-2392-4067-9d1a-9345fb58d8d1
	Detects automated lateral movement by Turla group	Unsupported	unsupported	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter Discovery File and Directory Discovery Discovery Network Share Discovery Lateral Movement Remote Services SMB/Windows Admin Shares	-	medium	Markus Neis	2017-11-07	2023-02-24	75925535-ca97-4e0a-a850-00b5c00779dc
Splunk	Detects identities generating anomalously large model responses relative to their own historical baseline. (...)	Anomaly	stable	-	-	AWS	Privilege Escalation, Stealth Process Injection	-	medium	Rod Soto	2026-07-06	2026-07-06	a839a6f7-aaac-438b-9d99-be0b49481e17
Splunk	Detects identities invoking high-risk filesystem and execution tools via AWS Bedrock Claude. (...)	Anomaly	stable	-	-	AWS	Privilege Escalation, Stealth Process Injection	-	medium	Rod Soto	2026-07-06	2026-07-06	989b3702-1df3-4076-9e2f-8dcbcc2b4bef

Title

Description

Empire S0363

Empire S0363

Empire MITRE reference S0363

Empire MITRE reference S0363

Standing S0363

Reach

Coverage

Empire detections S0363