Persistence
T1525 — Implant Internal Image
Adversaries may implant cloud or container images with malicious code to establish persistence after gaining access to an environment. Amazon Web Services (AWS) Amazon Machine Images (AMIs), Google Cloud Platform (GCP) Images, and Azure Images as well as popular container runtimes such as Docker can be implanted or backdoored...
Investigate Implant Internal Image activity in the context of Persistence: confirm scope, affected host/identity, and whether it matches expected administrative behaviour before deciding this is benign.
Platforms
IaaS, Containers
Priority / status
medium / draft
Evidence to collect
- Host or resource affected
- Account or identity involved
- Timestamp of the activity
- Related process, file, or network artifact
- Any preceding or follow-on alerts
D3-CIA · model
Container Image Analysis
Use Container Image Analysis to establish a baseline that makes this technique's deviations easier to spot.
Tooling: Defender for Endpoint
| ATT&CK Technique | D3FEND Technique | Practical SOC Action | Tooling |
|---|---|---|---|
| T1525 Implant Internal Image | Container Image Analysis | Use Container Image Analysis to establish a baseline that makes this technique's deviations easier to spot. | Defender for Endpoint |
T1525 Implant Internal Image → D3FEND → SOC action
Investigation steps — Microsoft
- Review Defender for Endpoint / Defender XDR alerts and timeline for the affected host or identity.
- Check Sentinel analytics rules and incidents correlated with this technique.
- Review Entra ID sign-in and audit logs if the technique involves an identity or cloud resource.
Investigation steps — generic
- Confirm whether the observed implant internal image activity matches expected administrative or application behaviour.
- Identify the host, account, or resource where the activity occurred and its business criticality.
- Check for related alerts before and after this activity to reconstruct the broader intrusion timeline.
- Real detection reference: "AWS Bedrock Untrusted Model Imported or Marketplace Endpoint Registered" -- Detects when an AWS Bedrock custom model is imported or deployed, or when a marketplace model endpoint is created or registered, via the CreateModelImportJob, CreateCustomModelDeployment, CreateMarketplaceModelEndpoint, or RegisterMarketplaceModelEndpoint API calls. These actions introduce a model artifact from outside the organization's trusted training and approval pipeline...
Response actions
| Action | Risk | Automation safe | Approval required |
|---|---|---|---|
| Contain the affected host or account | Medium | No | Yes |
| Collect and preserve evidence | Low | Yes | No |
KQL
Starting point for T1525
DeviceEvents
| where TimeGenerated > ago(24h)
| where ActionType has "<tune to T1525>" Escalation criteria
- Implant Internal Image activity observed on a privileged account or critical system.
- Activity follows or precedes other suspicious behaviour in the same investigation.
- Automated triage cannot confidently rule out malicious intent.
False positive considerations
- Legitimate administrative or maintenance activity matching this pattern.
- Approved security testing or red team exercise.
- Known benign software producing similar telemetry.
# T1525 - Implant Internal Image
## SOC Recommendation
Investigate Implant Internal Image activity in the context of Persistence: confirm scope, affected host/identity, and whether it matches expected administrative behaviour before deciding this is benign.
## D3FEND Mappings
| D3FEND Technique | Relationship | Practical SOC Action |
|---|---|---|
| Container Image Analysis | Model | Use Container Image Analysis to establish a baseline that makes this technique's deviations easier to spot. |
## Investigation Steps
1. Review Defender for Endpoint / Defender XDR alerts and timeline for the affected host or identity.
2. Check Sentinel analytics rules and incidents correlated with this technique.
3. Review Entra ID sign-in and audit logs if the technique involves an identity or cloud resource.
## Evidence to Collect
- Host or resource affected
- Account or identity involved
- Timestamp of the activity
- Related process, file, or network artifact
- Any preceding or follow-on alerts
## Response Actions
| Action | Risk | Automation Safe | Approval Required |
|---|---|---|---|
| Contain the affected host or account | Medium | No | Yes |
| Collect and preserve evidence | Low | Yes | No |
## KQL
```kql
DeviceEvents
| where TimeGenerated > ago(24h)
| where ActionType has "<tune to T1525>"
```
## Escalation Criteria
- Implant Internal Image activity observed on a privileged account or critical system.
- Activity follows or precedes other suspicious behaviour in the same investigation.
- Automated triage cannot confidently rule out malicious intent.
## False Positive Considerations
- Legitimate administrative or maintenance activity matching this pattern.
- Approved security testing or red team exercise.
- Known benign software producing similar telemetry.
Generated by SOC Response Atlas by Basyrix.
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- /api/techniques/T1525.json
- /api/recommendations/T1525.json
- /api/d3fend/T1525.json
- /api/mappings/T1525.json
- /api/confluence/T1525.md
Example curl:
curl https://atlas.basyrix.com/api/recommendations/T1525.json Response:
{
"technique_id": "T1525",
"name": "Implant Internal Image",
"priority": "medium",
"status": "draft",
"version": "0.1.0",
"last_reviewed": "2026-07-23",
"generated_by": "SOC Response Atlas by Basyrix",
"tactics": [
"Persistence"
],
"platforms": [
"IaaS",
"Containers"
],
"summary": "Adversaries may implant cloud or container images with malicious code to establish persistence after gaining access to an environment. Amazon Web Services (AWS) Amazon Machine Images (AMIs), Google Cloud Platform (GCP) Images, and Azure Images as well as popular container runtimes such as Docker can be implanted or backdoored...",
"soc_recommendation": "Investigate Implant Internal Image activity in the context of Persistence: confirm scope, affected host/identity, and whether it matches expected administrative behaviour before deciding this is benign.",
"d3fend_mappings": [
{
"id": "D3-CIA",
"name": "Container Image Analysis",
"relationship": "model",
"practical_action": "Use Container Image Analysis to establish a baseline that makes this technique's deviations easier to spot.",
"tooling": [
"Defender for Endpoint"
]
}
],
"investigation_steps": {
"microsoft": [
"Review Defender for Endpoint / Defender XDR alerts and timeline for the affected host or identity.",
"Check Sentinel analytics rules and incidents correlated with this technique.",
"Review Entra ID sign-in and audit logs if the technique involves an identity or cloud resource."
],
"generic": [
"Confirm whether the observed implant internal image activity matches expected administrative or application behaviour.",
"Identify the host, account, or resource where the activity occurred and its business criticality.",
"Check for related alerts before and after this activity to reconstruct the broader intrusion timeline.",
"Real detection reference: \"AWS Bedrock Untrusted Model Imported or Marketplace Endpoint Registered\" -- Detects when an AWS Bedrock custom model is imported or deployed, or when a marketplace model endpoint is created or registered, via the CreateModelImportJob, CreateCustomModelDeployment, CreateMarketplaceModelEndpoint, or RegisterMarketplaceModelEndpoint API calls. These actions introduce a model artifact from outside the organization's trusted training and approval pipeline..."
]
},
"evidence_to_collect": [
"Host or resource affected",
"Account or identity involved",
"Timestamp of the activity",
"Related process, file, or network artifact",
"Any preceding or follow-on alerts"
],
"response_actions": [
{
"name": "Contain the affected host or account",
"category": "Containment",
"risk": "Medium",
"automation_safe": false,
"approval_required": true,
"tool": "Defender for Endpoint / Entra ID",
"notes": "Requires approval -- confirm malicious intent before isolating a host or disabling an account."
},
{
"name": "Collect and preserve evidence",
"category": "Investigation",
"risk": "Low",
"automation_safe": true,
"approval_required": false,
"tool": "Defender for Endpoint",
"notes": "Safe -- read-only evidence collection."
}
],
"queries": {
"kql": [
{
"name": "Starting point for T1525",
"description": "Generic starting query -- tune to the specific data source relevant to this technique.",
"query": "DeviceEvents\n| where TimeGenerated > ago(24h)\n| where ActionType has \"<tune to T1525>\""
}
],
"spl": [],
"esql": [
{
"name": "c435defe-8438-4d5a-b4d0-86ab0faf9a49 — AWS Bedrock Untrusted Model Imported or Marketplace Endpoint Registered",
"description": "(KUERY) Detects when an AWS Bedrock custom model is imported or deployed, or when a marketplace model endpoint is created or registered, via the CreateModelImportJob, CreateCustomModelDeployment, CreateMarketplaceModelEndpoint, or RegisterMarketplaceModelEndpoint API calls. These actions introduce a model artifact from outside the organization's trusted training and approval pipeline... (Source: Elastic's official detection-rules repository (Elastic License v2).)",
"query": "data_stream.dataset: \"aws.cloudtrail\"\n and event.provider: \"bedrock.amazonaws.com\"\n and event.action: (\n \"CreateModelImportJob\" or\n \"CreateCustomModelDeployment\" or\n \"CreateMarketplaceModelEndpoint\" or\n \"RegisterMarketplaceModelEndpoint\"\n )\n and event.outcome: \"success\""
}
]
},
"automation": {
"safe": [
"Add recommendation as Sentinel incident comment.",
"Run enrichment queries.",
"Create ServiceNow SecOps task."
],
"approval_required": [
"Contain or disable the affected host/account.",
"Any change to production configuration."
]
},
"escalation_criteria": [
"Implant Internal Image activity observed on a privileged account or critical system.",
"Activity follows or precedes other suspicious behaviour in the same investigation.",
"Automated triage cannot confidently rule out malicious intent."
],
"false_positive_considerations": [
"Legitimate administrative or maintenance activity matching this pattern.",
"Approved security testing or red team exercise.",
"Known benign software producing similar telemetry."
],
"confluence": {
"title": "T1525 - Implant Internal Image Response Guidance",
"labels": [
"mitre",
"attack",
"d3fend",
"secops",
"basyrix"
],
"sections": [
"summary",
"d3fend_mappings",
"investigation_steps",
"response_actions",
"queries",
"automation",
"escalation_criteria",
"false_positive_considerations"
]
}
}