malware

ZxShell S0412

Type: malware
Platform: Windows
Created: 24 September 2019
Last modified: 16 April 2025

ZxShell is a remote administration tool and backdoor that can be downloaded from the Internet, particularly from Chinese hacker websites. It has been used since at least 2004.[1][2]

TechniquesTop 5%

TacticsTop 1%

Threat groupsunranked

CampaignsNone recorded

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

Standing S0412

Reach is how much of ATT&CK this malware touches. Coverage is how well defended each thing it does is, as a median per technique rather than a total — a total would just restate the reach. Each figure is ranked against all 825 ATT&CK software entries only where that population actually spreads. Where most of the population shares one value, a percentile would rank the tie instead of the entity, so the raw value is shown and no rank is claimed.

Select	Description	Category	Status	Event	OS	Product	MITRE ATT&CK	CVEs	Severity	Author	Created	Updated	ID
	Detects file access requests to files ending with either the ".hive"/".reg" extension, usually associated with Windows Registry backups.	Hunting	test	file_access	windows	-	Persistence, Defense Impairment Modify Registry	-	low	frack113	2023-09-15	2024-07-29	337a31c6-46c4-46be-886a-260d7aa78cac
Splunk	The following analytic identifies access to the /api/v1/configuration/users/user-roles/user-role/rest-userrole1/web/web-bookmarks/bookmark endpoint, which is associated with CVE-2023-46805 and CVE-2024-21887 vulnerabilities. (...)	Generic	stable	webserver	-	Suricata	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2024-21887 CVE-2023-46805 CVE-2023-46085	medium	Michael Haag, Splunk	2024-01-17	2026-05-13	15838756-f425-43fa-9d88-a7f88063e81a
	Detect set Notification_Suppress to 1 to disable the Windows security center notification	Generic	test	registry_set	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Persistence, Defense Impairment Modify Registry	-	medium	frack113	2022-08-19	2023-08-17	0c93308a-3f1b-40a9-b649-57ea1a1c1d63
	Detect set DisallowRun to 1 to prevent user running specific computer program	Generic	test	registry_set	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Persistence, Defense Impairment Modify Registry	-	medium	frack113	2022-08-19	2023-08-17	275641a5-a492-45e2-a817-7c81e9d9d3e9
Splunk	The following analytic detects the use of commands to add or set exclusions in Windows Defender. It (...)	Generic	stable	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security · CrowdStrike	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	medium	Teoderick Contreras, Nasreddine Bencherchali, Splunk	2021-11-25	2026-06-08	773b66fe-4dd9-11ec-8289-acde48001122
	Detects execution of "reg.exe" commands with the "add" or "copy" flags on safe boot registry keys. (...)	Generic	test	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	high	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2022-09-02	2024-03-19	d7662ff6-9e97-4596-a61d-9839e32dee8d
	Detects suspicious local connections via a named pipe to the AD FS configuration database (Windows Internal Database). (...)	Generic	test	pipe_created	windows	Sysmon	Collection Data from Local System	-	medium	Roberto Rodriguez @Cyb3rWard0g	2021-10-08	2023-11-30	1ea13e8c-03ea-409b-877d-ce5c3d2c1cb3
Splunk	The following analytic detects potential exploitation attempts against Adobe ColdFusion vulnerabilities CVE-2023-29298 and CVE-2023-26360. (...)	Anomaly	stable	webserver	-	Suricata	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2023-29298 CVE-2023-26360	medium	Michael Haag, Splunk	2023-08-23	2026-05-13	d6821c0b-fcdc-4c95-a77f-e10752fae41a
Splunk	The following analytic detects potential exploitation of the Adobe ColdFusion vulnerability, CVE-2023-26360, which allows unauthenticated arbitrary file read. (...)	Anomaly	stable	webserver	-	Suricata	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2023-26360	medium	Michael Haag, Splunk	2023-08-23	2026-05-13	695aceae-21db-4e7f-93ac-a52e39d02b93
	Detects the deletion of the "Zone.Identifier" ADS. (...)	Hunting	test	file_delete	windows	Sysmon	Stealth Indicator Removal File Deletion	-	low	frack113	2023-09-04	—	7eac0a16-5832-4e81-865f-0268a6d19e4b
	Detects the deletion of the "Zone.Identifier" ADS by an uncommon process. (...)	Generic	test	file_delete	windows	Sysmon	Stealth Indicator Removal File Deletion	-	medium	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-09-04	2025-07-04	3109530e-ab47-4cc6-a953-cac5ebcc93ae
	Detects suspicious access to URLs that was noticed in cases in which attackers exploitated the ADSel (...)	Emerging	test	webserver	-	-	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2021-40539	high	Tobias Michalski (Nextron Systems), Max Altgelt (Nextron Systems)	2021-09-20	2023-01-02	6702b13c-e421-44cc-ab33-42cc25570f11
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
Splunk	The following analytic detects suspicious modifications to firewall rule registry settings that allow inbound traffic on specific ports with a public profile. (...)	Generic	stable	registry_event	windows	Sysmon	Lateral Movement Remote Services Remote Desktop Protocol	-	medium	Teoderick Contreras, Splunk, Steven Dick	2021-05-26	2026-05-13	0a46537c-be02-11eb-92ca-acde48001122
Splunk	The following analytic detects a suspicious PowerShell command that allows inbound traffic to a specific local port within the public profile. (...)	Generic	stable	ps_script	windows	PowerShell	Lateral Movement Remote Services Remote Desktop Protocol	-	medium	Teoderick Contreras, Splunk	2021-05-19	2026-05-13	a5d85486-b89c-11eb-8267-acde48001122
	Detect enable rdp feature to allow specific user to rdp connect on the targeted machine	Generic	test	registry_set	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Persistence, Defense Impairment Modify Registry	-	medium	frack113	2022-08-19	2023-08-17	37b437cf-3fc5-4c8e-9c94-1d7c9aff842b
	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 code fragments found in small and obfuscated AMSI bypass PowerShell scripts	Generic	test	ps_script	windows	PowerShell	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	high	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems)	2022-11-09	—	e0d6c087-2d1c-47fd-8799-3904103c5a98
	Detects attempts to disable AMSI (Anti-Malware Scan Interface) by modifying the AmsiEnable registry value. (...)	Generic	experimental	registry_set	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	high	Swachchhanda Shrawan Poudel (Nextron Systems)	2025-12-25	—	aa37cbb0-da36-42cb-a90f-fdf216fc7467
	Detects activity that indicates a user disabling the ability for Antivirus mini filter to inspect a "Dev Drive".	Generic	test	registry_set	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	high	@kostastsale, Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2023-11-05	2024-08-16	31e124fb-5dc4-42a0-83b3-44a69c77b271
	Detects attempts to exploit an apache spark server via CVE-2014-6287 from a commandline perspective	Emerging	test	process_creation	linux	Sysmon	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2014-6287 CVE-2022-33891	high	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2022-07-20	—	c8a5f584-cdc8-42cc-8cce-0398e4265de3
	Detects attempts to exploit an apache spark server via CVE-2014-6287 from a weblogs perspective	Emerging	test	webserver	-	-	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2014-6287 CVE-2022-33891	high	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2022-07-19	2023-01-02	1a9a04fd-02d1-465c-abad-d733fd409f9c
	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 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 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 indicators of APT 29 (Cozy Bear) phishing-campaign as reported by mandiant	Emerging	stable	process_creation	windows	Sysmon · WinEventLog Security	Stealth System Binary Proxy Execution Rundll32	-	critical	Florian Roth (Nextron Systems), @41thexplorer	2018-11-20	2023-03-08	7453575c-a747-40b9-839b-125a0aae324b
	Detects indicators of APT 29 (Cozy Bear) phishing-campaign as reported by mandiant	Emerging	stable	file_event	windows	Sysmon	Stealth System Binary Proxy Execution Rundll32	-	critical	@41thexplorer	2018-11-20	2023-02-20	3a3f81ca-652c-482b-adeb-b1c804727f74
	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 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 exploitation of vulnerabilities in Arcadyan routers as reported in CVE-2021-20090 and CVE-2021-20091.	Emerging	test	webserver	-	-	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2021-20091 CVE-2021-20090	critical	Bhabesh Raj	2021-08-24	2023-01-02	f0500377-bc70-425d-ac8c-e956cd906871
	Detects actions that disable Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) in Linux, including: - Use (...)	Generic	experimental	process_creation	linux	Linux Auditd	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools Privilege Escalation, Stealth Process Injection Proc Memory	-	high	Milad Cheraghi	2025-05-26	2025-12-05	e497a24e-9345-4a62-9803-b06d7d7cb132
	Detects attempts to exploit the Atlassian Bitbucket Command Injection CVE-2022-36804	Emerging	test	webserver	-	-	Initial Access Exploit Public-Facing Application	CVE-2022-36804	high	Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)	2022-09-29	2023-01-02	65c0a0ab-d675-4441-bd6b-d3db226a2685
	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
	Detect changes in auditd configuration files	Generic	test	file_event	linux	Linux Auditd	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	high	Mikhail Larin, oscd.community	2019-10-25	2021-11-27	977ef627-4539-4875-adf4-ed8f780c4922
	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
	Detects deletion of an Amazon Bedrock guardrail, which may indicate attempts to remove model safety (...)	Generic	experimental	cloud_audit	-	AWS CloudTrail · AWS	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	medium	Marco Pedrinazzi (@pedrinazziM) (InTheCyber)	2026-07-10	—	59b70e4d-dd17-44a9-b740-acf07ae3eb6a
	Detects updates to an Amazon Bedrock guardrail, which may indicate attempts to weaken model safety c (...)	Generic	experimental	cloud_audit	-	AWS CloudTrail · AWS	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	medium	Marco Pedrinazzi (@pedrinazziM) (InTheCyber)	2026-07-10	—	1c722651-254a-4b04-a9f4-99b62a2d0a1f
	Detects changes to the EC2 instance startup script. (...)	Generic	test	cloud_audit	-	AWS CloudTrail · AWS	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter PowerShell Windows Command Shell Unix Shell	-	high	faloker	2020-02-12	2022-06-07	1ab3c5ed-5baf-417b-bb6b-78ca33f6c3df
	An attempt to export an AWS EC2 instance has been detected. (...)	Generic	test	cloud_audit	-	AWS CloudTrail · AWS	Collection Data from Local System Exfiltration Transfer Data to Cloud Account	-	low	Diogo Braz	2020-04-16	2022-10-05	54b9a76a-3c71-4673-b4b3-2edb4566ea7b
	Detects successful deletion or disabling of an AWS GuardDuty detector, possibly by an attacker trying to avoid detection of its malicious activities. (...)	Generic	experimental	cloud_audit	-	AWS CloudTrail · AWS	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools Disable or Modify Cloud Log	-	high	suktech24	2025-11-27	—	d2656e78-c069-4571-8220-9e0ab5913f19
	Detects updates of the GuardDuty list of trusted IPs, perhaps to disable security alerts against malicious IPs.	Generic	test	cloud_audit	-	AWS CloudTrail · AWS	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	high	faloker	2020-02-11	2022-10-09	6e61ee20-ce00-4f8d-8aee-bedd8216f7e3
	Detects evade to Macie detection.	Unsupported	unsupported	cloud_audit	-	AWS CloudTrail · AWS	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	medium	Sittikorn S	2021-07-06	2023-03-24	91f6a16c-ef71-437a-99ac-0b070e3ad221
	Detects the modification of the findings on SecurityHub.	Generic	stable	cloud_audit	-	AWS CloudTrail · AWS	Defense Impairment Disable or Modify Tools	-	high	Sittikorn S	2021-06-28	—	a607e1fe-74bf-4440-a3ec-b059b9103157
	Detects file creation events linked to the Axios NPM supply chain compromise. (...)	Emerging	experimental	file_event	linux	Sysmon	Command and Control Ingress Tool Transfer Initial Access Supply Chain Compromise Compromise Software Supply Chain	-	high	Swachchhanda Shrawan Poudel (Nextron Systems)	2026-04-01	—	b7cb840c-11f6-47f7-b3ef-5524739c9077
	Detects file creation events linked to the Axios NPM supply chain compromise on macOS devices. (...)	Emerging	experimental	file_event	macos	-	Command and Control Ingress Tool Transfer Initial Access Supply Chain Compromise Compromise Software Supply Chain	-	high	Swachchhanda Shrawan Poudel (Nextron Systems)	2026-04-01	—	2db0458c-05c9-4069-a26f-77becd9c8c13
	Detects the Linux-specific execution chain of the plain-crypto-js malicious npm dependency by Axios NPM package, including payload download via curl and detached execution using nohup and python3. (...)	Emerging	experimental	process_creation	linux	Sysmon	Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter Unix Shell Python Command and Control Ingress Tool Transfer Initial Access Supply Chain Compromise Compromise Software Supply Chain	-	high	Swachchhanda Shrawan Poudel (Nextron Systems)	2026-04-01	—	0a23a62d-c5b3-468b-a072-25064a9a8c87

Title

Description

ZxShell S0412

ZxShell MITRE reference S0412

Standing S0412

Reach

Coverage

ZxShell detections S0412