T1649 — Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates

# T1649 - Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates

## SOC Recommendation
Investigate Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates activity in the context of Credential Access: 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 |
|---|---|---|
| File Analysis | Detect | Monitor for File Analysis indicators relevant to this technique. |
| File Encryption | Harden | Apply File Encryption to reduce this technique's viability before an incident occurs. |
| File Eviction | Evict | Use File Eviction to remove the adversary's foothold once this technique is confirmed. |
| Content Filtering | Isolate | Apply Content Filtering to contain the blast radius once this technique is observed. |

## 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 T1649>"
```

## Escalation Criteria
- Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates 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/T1649.json
• /api/recommendations/T1649.json
• /api/d3fend/T1649.json
• /api/mappings/T1649.json
• /api/confluence/T1649.md

Example curl:

curl https://atlas.basyrix.com/api/recommendations/T1649.json

Response:

{
  "technique_id": "T1649",
  "name": "Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates",
  "priority": "high",
  "status": "draft",
  "version": "0.1.0",
  "last_reviewed": "2026-07-23",
  "generated_by": "SOC Response Atlas by Basyrix",
  "tactics": [
    "Credential Access"
  ],
  "platforms": [
    "Windows",
    "Linux",
    "macOS",
    "Identity Provider"
  ],
  "summary": "Adversaries may steal or forge certificates used for authentication to access remote systems or resources. Digital certificates are often used to sign and encrypt messages and/or files. Certificates are also used as authentication material. For example, Entra ID device certificates and Active Directory Certificate Services (AD CS) certificates bind to an identity and can be used as credentials for domain accounts. Authentication certificates can be both stolen and forged...",
  "soc_recommendation": "Investigate Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates activity in the context of Credential Access: confirm scope, affected host/identity, and whether it matches expected administrative behaviour before deciding this is benign.",
  "d3fend_mappings": [
    {
      "id": "D3-FA",
      "name": "File Analysis",
      "relationship": "detect",
      "practical_action": "Monitor for File Analysis indicators relevant to this technique.",
      "tooling": [
        "Defender for Endpoint"
      ]
    },
    {
      "id": "D3-FE",
      "name": "File Encryption",
      "relationship": "harden",
      "practical_action": "Apply File Encryption to reduce this technique's viability before an incident occurs.",
      "tooling": [
        "Defender for Endpoint"
      ]
    },
    {
      "id": "D3-FEV",
      "name": "File Eviction",
      "relationship": "evict",
      "practical_action": "Use File Eviction to remove the adversary's foothold once this technique is confirmed.",
      "tooling": [
        "Defender for Endpoint"
      ]
    },
    {
      "id": "D3-CF",
      "name": "Content Filtering",
      "relationship": "isolate",
      "practical_action": "Apply Content Filtering to contain the blast radius once this technique is observed.",
      "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 steal or forge authentication certificates 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: \"Access to a Sensitive LDAP Attribute\" -- Identify access to sensitive Active Directory object attributes that contains credentials and decryption keys such as unixUserPassword, ms-PKI-AccountCredentials and msPKI-CredentialRoamingTokens."
    ]
  },
  "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 T1649",
        "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 T1649>\""
      }
    ],
    "spl": [],
    "esql": [
      {
        "name": "764c9fcd-4c4c-41e6-a0c7-d6c46c2eff66 — Access to a Sensitive LDAP Attribute",
        "description": "(EQL) Identify access to sensitive Active Directory object attributes that contains credentials and decryption keys such as unixUserPassword, ms-PKI-AccountCredentials and msPKI-CredentialRoamingTokens. (Source: Elastic's official detection-rules repository (Elastic License v2).)",
        "query": "any where host.os.type == \"windows\" and event.code == \"4662\" and\n\n  not winlog.event_data.SubjectUserSid : \"S-1-5-18\" and\n\n  winlog.event_data.Properties : (\n   /* unixUserPassword */\n  \"*612cb747-c0e8-4f92-9221-fdd5f15b550d*\",\n\n  /* ms-PKI-AccountCredentials */\n  \"*b8dfa744-31dc-4ef1-ac7c-84baf7ef9da7*\",\n\n  /*  ms-PKI-DPAPIMasterKeys */\n  \"*b3f93023-9239-4f7c-b99c-6745d87adbc2*\",\n\n  /* msPKI-CredentialRoamingTokens */\n  \"*b7ff5a38-0818-42b0-8110-d3d154c97f24*\"\n  ) and\n\n  /*\n   Excluding noisy AccessMasks\n   0x0 undefined and 0x100 Control Access\n   https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security/threat-protection/auditing/event-4662\n   */\n  not winlog.event_data.AccessMask in (\"0x0\", \"0x100\")"
      },
      {
        "name": "ac96ceb8-4399-4191-af1d-4feeac1f1f46 — Potential Invoke-Mimikatz PowerShell Script",
        "description": "(KUERY) Identifies PowerShell script block content containing Invoke-Mimikatz or Mimikatz commands used to dump credentials, extract password stores, export certificates, or use alternate authentication material. These patterns can indicate in-memory credential access and require reconstructed script context and follow-on telemetry to assess impact. (Source: Elastic's official detection-rules repository (Elastic License v2).)",
        "query": "event.category:process and host.os.type:windows and\npowershell.file.script_block_text:(\n  (DumpCreds and DumpCerts) or\n  \"sekurlsa::logonpasswords\" or\n  \"sekurlsa::ekeys\" or\n  \"sekurlsa::tickets\" or\n  \"sekurlsa::pth\" or\n  \"sekurlsa::minidump\" or\n  \"lsadump::sam\" or\n  \"lsadump::secrets\" or\n  \"lsadump::cache\" or\n  \"lsadump::dcsync\" or\n  \"vault::cred\" or\n  \"dpapi::cred\" or\n  (\"crypto::certificates\" and\n  \"CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_LOCAL_MACHINE\")\n)"
      }
    ]
  },
  "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": [
    "Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates 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": "T1649 - Steal or Forge Authentication Certificates Response Guidance",
    "labels": [
      "mitre",
      "attack",
      "d3fend",
      "secops",
      "basyrix"
    ],
    "sections": [
      "summary",
      "d3fend_mappings",
      "investigation_steps",
      "response_actions",
      "queries",
      "automation",
      "escalation_criteria",
      "false_positive_considerations"
    ]
  }
}