T1136.001: Local Account

MITRE ATT&CK® Enterprise technique

Description

Adversaries may create a local account to maintain access to victim systems. Local accounts are those configured by an organization for use by users, remote support, services, or for administration on a single system or service.

For example, with a sufficient level of access, the Windows <code>net user /add</code> command can be used to create a local account. In Linux, the useradd command can be used, while on macOS systems, the <code>dscl -create</code> command can be used. Local accounts may also be added to network devices, often via common Network Device CLI commands such as <code>username</code>, to ESXi servers via esxcli system account add, or to Kubernetes clusters using the kubectl utility.(Citation: cisco_username_cmd)(Citation: Kubernetes Service Accounts Security)

Adversaries may also create new local accounts on network firewall management consoles – for example, by exploiting a vulnerable firewall management system, threat actors may be able to establish super-admin accounts that could be used to modify firewall rules and gain further access to the network.(Citation: Cyber Security News)

Such accounts may be used to establish secondary credentialed access that do not require persistent remote access tools to be deployed on the system.

Detection

(no detection guidance published)

Data sources

• (none listed)

References

• ATT&CK page: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1136/001
• ATT&CK Enterprise matrix: https://attack.mitre.org/matrices/enterprise/