Adversaries may abuse cloud management services to execute commands within virtual machines or hybrid-joined devices. Resources such as AWS Systems Manager, Azure RunCommand, and Runbooks allow users to remotely run scripts in virtual machines by leveraging installed virtual machine agents. Similarly, in Azure AD environments, Microsoft Endpoint Manager allows Global or Intune Administrators to run scripts as SYSTEM on on-premises devices joined to the Azure AD.[1][2][3]
If an adversary gains administrative access to a cloud environment, they may be able to abuse cloud management services to execute commands in the environment’s virtual machines or on-premises hybrid-joined devices. Additionally, an adversary that compromises a service provider or delegated administrator account may similarly be able to leverage a Trusted Relationship to execute commands in connected virtual machines.[4]
| ID | Name | Description |
|---|---|---|
| S0677 | AADInternals |
AADInternals can execute commands on Azure virtual machines using the VM agent.[5] |
| G0016 | APT29 |
APT29 has used Azure Run Command and Azure Admin-on-Behalf-of (AOBO) to execute code on virtual machines.[4] |
| S1091 | Pacu |
Pacu can run commands on EC2 instances using AWS Systems Manager Run Command.[6] |
| ID | Mitigation | Description |
|---|---|---|
| M1026 | Privileged Account Management |
Limit the number of cloud accounts with permissions to remotely execute commands on virtual machines, and ensure that these are not used for day-to-day operations. In Azure, limit the number of accounts with the roles Azure Virtual Machine Contributer and above, and consider using temporary Just-in-Time (JIT) roles to avoid permanently assigning privileged access to virtual machines.[7] In Azure AD, limit the number of Global and Intune administrators to only those required. In AWS, limit users with permission to execute the |
| ID | Data Source | Data Component | Detects |
|---|---|---|---|
| DS0017 | Command | Command Execution |
Monitor commands and scripts executed on virtual machines. In Azure, usage of Azure RunCommand can be identified via the Azure Activity Logs, and additional details on the result of executed jobs are available in the |
| DS0009 | Process | Process Creation |
Monitor virtual machines for the creation of processes associated with cloud virtual machine agents. In Windows-based Azure machines, monitor for the WindowsAzureGuestAgent.exe process.[7] |
| DS0012 | Script | Script Execution |
Monitor commands and scripts executed on virtual machines. In Azure, usage of Azure RunCommand can be identified via the Azure Activity Logs, and additional details on the result of executed jobs are available in the |