The White Company is a likely state-sponsored threat actor with advanced capabilities. From 2017 through 2018, the group led an espionage campaign called Operation Shaheen targeting government and military organizations in Pakistan.
Disclaimer: We present this mapping to stimulate thinking about active defense options to combat this adversary, not to present all possibilities. We invite you to use this as a guide and add your own use cases for applying Shield techniques to counter each adversary action.
Note: All ATT&CK Group sub-technique mappings have been remapped to their parent technique and were derived from Group Technique mappings in ATT&CK v8.
ATT&CK Technique | Opportunity Space | AD Technique | Use Case |
---|---|---|---|
T1027 - Obfuscated Files or Information | In an adversary engagement scenario, there is an opportunity to introduce decoy systems that can influence an adversary's behavior or allow you to observe how they perform a specific task. | DTE0017 - Decoy System | A defender could implement a decoy system to study how and when an adversary obfuscate files and hides information. |
T1070 - Indicator Removal on Host | In an adversary engagement scenario, there is an opportunity to allow or restrict admin access to support your defensive objectives. | DTE0001 - Admin Access | A defender can restrict admin access to force an adversary to escalate privileges in order to delete logs and captured artifacts from a system. |
T1070 - Indicator Removal on Host | There is an opportunity to detect the presence of an adversary by identifying and alerting on anomalous behaviors. | DTE0007 - Behavioral Analytics | A defender can look for anomalies in how commands are being executed on a system. This can expose potentially malicious activity. |
T1124 - System Time Discovery | There is an opportunity for the defender to observe the adversary and control what they can see, what effects they can have, and/or what data they can access. | DTE0036 - Software Manipulation | If the defender knows the specific regions an adversary is targeting, they can alter the output of commands which return systems times to return data consistent with what an adversary would want to see. |
T1203 - Exploitation for Client Execution | There is an opportunity to study the adversary and collect first-hand observations about them and their tools. | DTE0017 - Decoy System | A defender can use a decoy system to see if an adversary exploits vulnerable software in order to compromise the system. |
T1203 - Exploitation for Client Execution | There is an opportunity to discover who or what is being targeting by an adversary. | DTE0004 - Application Diversity | A defender can install one or more applications on a decoy system with a variety of patch levels to see how an adversary might exploit those applications. |
T1204 - User Execution | There is an opportunity to study the adversary and collect first-hand observations about them and their tools. | DTE0018 - Detonate Malware | A defender can execute adversary malware on a decoy system and examine its behaviors or potentially engage with the adversary to obtain further intelligence. |
T1518 - Software Discovery | There is an opportunity to provide a variety of applications to an adversary to see what things an adversary prefers or to influence their operations. | DTE0004 - Application Diversity | A defender can install an array of various software packages on a system to make it look used and populated. This will give an adversary a collection of software to interact with and possibly expose additional techniques. |
T1566 - Phishing | A phishing email can be detected and blocked from arriving at the intended recipient. | DTE0019 - Email Manipulation | A defender can intercept emails that are detected as suspicious or malicious by email detection tools and prevent deliver to the intended target. |
T1566 - Phishing | A phishing email can be detected and moved from the intended recipient to a decoy account for reading and execution. | DTE0023 - Migrate Attack Vector | A defender can move suspicious emails to a decoy system prior to opening and examining the email. |
T1566 - Phishing | Users trained and encouraged to report phishing can detect attacks that other defenses do not. | DTE0035 - User Training | A program to train and exercise the anti-phishing skills of users can create "Human Sensors" that help detect phishing attacks. |
T1566 - Phishing | There is an opportunity to discover who or what is being targeting by an adversary. | DTE0015 - Decoy Persona | A defender can seed information about the decoy persona's personal accounts on systems to see if the adversary collects and uses that information in future activity. |