Software Deployment Tools

APT32 compromised McAfee ePO to move laterally by distributing malware as a software deployment task.(Citation: FireEye APT32 May 2017)

Silence has used RAdmin, a remote software tool used to remotely control workstations and ATMs.(Citation: Group IB Silence Sept 2018)

It is believed that a patch management system for an anti-virus product commonly installed among targeted companies was used to distribute the Wiper malware.(Citation: Dell Wiper)

Threat Group-1314 actors used a victim's endpoint management platform, Altiris, for lateral movement.(Citation: Dell TG-1314)

Manage the creation, modification, use, and permissions associated to user accounts.

Configure Active Directory to prevent use of certain techniques; use SID Filtering, etc.

Perform regular software updates to mitigate exploitation risk.

Manage the creation, modification, use, and permissions associated to privileged accounts, including SYSTEM and root.

Set and enforce secure password policies for accounts.

Architect sections of the network to isolate critical systems, functions, or resources. Use physical and logical segmentation to prevent access to potentially sensitive systems and information. Use a DMZ to contain any internet-facing services that should not be exposed from the internal network. Configure separate virtual private cloud (VPC) instances to isolate critical cloud systems.

Train users to be aware of access or manipulation attempts by an adversary to reduce the risk of successful spearphishing, social engineering, and other techniques that involve user interaction.

Evaluate the security of third-party software that could be used in the enterprise environment. Ensure that access to management systems for third-party systems is limited, monitored, and secure. Have a strict approval policy for use of third-party systems. Grant access to Third-party systems only to a limited number of authorized administrators. Ensure proper system and access isolation for critical network systems through use of firewalls, account privilege separation, group policy, and multi-factor authentication. Verify that account credentials that may be used to access third-party systems are unique and not used throughout the enterprise network. Ensure that any accounts used by third-party providers to access these systems are traceable to the third-party and are not used throughout the network or used by other third-party providers in the same environment. Ensure third-party systems are regularly patched by users or the provider to prevent potential remote access through Exploitation for Privilege Escalation. Ensure there are regular reviews of accounts provisioned to these systems to verify continued business need, and ensure there is governance to trace de-provisioning of access that is no longer required. Where the third-party system is used for deployment services, ensure that it can be configured to deploy only signed binaries, then ensure that the trusted signing certificates are not co-located with the third-party system and are instead located on a system that cannot be accessed remotely or to which remote access is tightly controlled.

Use two or more pieces of evidence to authenticate to a system; such as username and password in addition to a token from a physical smart card or token generator.

Use remote security log and sensitive file storage where access can be controlled better to prevent exposure of intrusion detection log data or sensitive information.