Credentials from Password Stores: Securityd Memory

An adversary with root access may gather credentials by reading securityd’s memory. securityd is a service/daemon responsible for implementing security protocols such as encryption and authorization.[1] A privileged adversary may be able to scan through securityd's memory to find the correct sequence of keys to decrypt the user’s logon keychain. This may provide the adversary with various plaintext passwords, such as those for users, WiFi, mail, browsers, certificates, secure notes, etc.[2][3]

In OS X prior to El Capitan, users with root access can read plaintext keychain passwords of logged-in users because Apple’s keychain implementation allows these credentials to be cached so that users are not repeatedly prompted for passwords.[2][4] Apple’s securityd utility takes the user’s logon password, encrypts it with PBKDF2, and stores this master key in memory. Apple also uses a set of keys and algorithms to encrypt the user’s password, but once the master key is found, an adversary need only iterate over the other values to unlock the final password.[2]

ID: T1555.002
Sub-technique of:  T1555
Platforms: Linux, macOS
Version: 1.2
Created: 12 February 2020
Last Modified: 29 March 2024

Procedure Examples

ID Name Description
S0276 Keydnap

Keydnap uses the keychaindump project to read securityd memory.[5]

Mitigations

This type of attack technique cannot be easily mitigated with preventive controls since it is based on the abuse of system features.

Detection

ID Data Source Data Component Detects
DS0017 Command Command Execution

Monitor executed commands and arguments that may obtain root access (allowing them to read securityd’s memory), then they can scan through memory to find the correct sequence of keys in relatively few tries to decrypt the user’s logon keychain.

DS0009 Process Process Access

Monitor for processes being accessed that may obtain root access (allowing them to read securityd’s memory), then they can scan through memory to find the correct sequence of keys in relatively few tries to decrypt the user’s logon keychain.

References