T1003.002: Security Account Manager

MITRE ATT&CK® Enterprise technique

Description

Adversaries may attempt to extract credential material from the Security Account Manager (SAM) database either through in-memory techniques or through the Windows Registry where the SAM database is stored. The SAM is a database file that contains local accounts for the host, typically those found with the <code>net user</code> command. Enumerating the SAM database requires SYSTEM level access.

A number of tools can be used to retrieve the SAM file through in-memory techniques:

• pwdumpx.exe
• gsecdump
• Mimikatz
• secretsdump.py

Alternatively, the SAM can be extracted from the Registry with Reg:

• <code>reg save HKLM\sam sam</code>
• <code>reg save HKLM\system system</code>

Creddump7 can then be used to process the SAM database locally to retrieve hashes.(Citation: GitHub Creddump7)

Notes:

• RID 500 account is the local, built-in administrator.
• RID 501 is the guest account.
• User accounts start with a RID of 1,000+.

Detection

(no detection guidance published)

Data sources

• (none listed)

References

• ATT&CK page: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1003/002
• ATT&CK Enterprise matrix: https://attack.mitre.org/matrices/enterprise/