↳ GitHub sourceAnalytics ruleHigh

AWSCloudTrail - Creation of EC2 policy and then privilege escalation

Description

Identifies creation of IAM policies that grant broad EC2 permissions or EC2 actions combined with IAM pass-role capability, followed by policy attachment activity. This pattern can indicate attempts to gain elevated cloud execution privileges and should be validated as authorized change activity.
Rule type
Scheduled
Version
1.0.4
Declared status
Available
Query frequency
1d
Query period
1d
Trigger
gt 0

Declared MITRE coverage

Declared sources

Metadata from the source file. No dependencies inferred from KQL.

Connectors

Data types

KQL query

Original query, unchanged.

let EventNameList = dynamic(["AttachUserPolicy","AttachRolePolicy","AttachGroupPolicy"]);
let createPolicy =  dynamic(["CreatePolicy", "CreatePolicyVersion"]);
let timeframe = 1d;
let lookback = 14d;
// Creating Master table with all the events to use with materialize for better performance
let EventInfo = AWSCloudTrail
| where TimeGenerated >= ago(lookback)
| where EventName in (EventNameList) or EventName in (createPolicy)
| extend UserIdentityArn = iif(isempty(UserIdentityArn), tostring(parse_json(Resources)[0].ARN), UserIdentityArn)
| extend UserName = tostring(split(UserIdentityArn, '/')[-1])
| extend AccountName = case( UserIdentityPrincipalid == "Anonymous", "Anonymous", isempty(UserIdentityUserName), UserName, UserIdentityUserName)
| extend AccountName = iif(AccountName contains "@", tostring(split(AccountName, '@', 0)[0]), AccountName),
  AccountUPNSuffix = iif(AccountName contains "@", tostring(split(AccountName, '@', 1)[0]), "");
//Checking for Policy creation event with Full Admin Privileges since lookback period.
let FullAdminPolicyEvents =  materialize(  EventInfo
| where TimeGenerated >= ago(lookback)
| where EventName in (createPolicy)
| extend PolicyName = tostring(parse_json(RequestParameters).policyName)
| extend Statement = parse_json(tostring((parse_json(RequestParameters).policyDocument))).Statement
| mvexpand Statement
| extend Action = parse_json(Statement).Action , Effect = tostring(parse_json(Statement).Effect), Resource = tostring(parse_json(Statement).Resource), Condition = tostring(parse_json(Statement).Condition)
| extend Action = tostring(Action)
| where Effect =~ "Allow" and ((((Action contains "iam:*" or Action contains "iam:PassRole") and Action contains "ec2:*") or ((Action contains "iam:*" or Action contains "iam:PassRole") and Action contains "ec2:RunInstances") or ((Action contains "iam:*" or Action contains "iam:PassRole") and Action contains "ec2:Run*")) or (Action contains "ec2:*") or (Action contains "ec2:ListInstances" and Action contains "ec2:StartInstance" and Action contains "ec2:ModifyInstanceAttribute") or (Action contains "ec2:List*" and Action contains "ec2:Start*" and Action contains "ec2:Modify*")) and Resource == "*" and Condition == ""
| distinct TimeGenerated, EventName, PolicyName, SourceIpAddress, UserIdentityArn, RecipientAccountId, AccountName, AccountUPNSuffix
| project-rename StartTime = TimeGenerated  );
let PolicyAttach = materialize(  EventInfo
| where TimeGenerated >= ago(timeframe)
| where EventName in (EventNameList) and isempty(ErrorCode) and isempty(ErrorMessage)
| extend PolicyName = tostring(split(tostring(parse_json(RequestParameters).policyArn),"/")[1])
| summarize AttachEventCount=count(), StartTime = min(TimeGenerated), EndTime = max(TimeGenerated) by EventSource, EventName,   UserIdentityType , UserIdentityArn, SourceIpAddress, RecipientAccountId, AccountName, AccountUPNSuffix, PolicyName
| extend AttachEvent = pack("StartTime", StartTime, "EndTime", EndTime, "EventName", EventName, "UserIdentityType",   UserIdentityType,  "AccountName", AccountName, "AccountUPNSuffix", AccountUPNSuffix, "RecipientAccountId", RecipientAccountId, "UserIdentityArn", UserIdentityArn, "SourceIpAddress", SourceIpAddress)
| project EventSource, PolicyName, AttachEvent, RecipientAccountId, AccountName, AccountUPNSuffix, AttachEventCount
);
// Joining the list of PolicyNames and checking if it has been attached to any Roles/Users/Groups.
// These Roles/Users/Groups will be Privileged and can be used by adversaries as pivot point for privilege escalation via multiple ways.
FullAdminPolicyEvents
| join kind=leftouter
(
    PolicyAttach
)
on PolicyName
| project-away PolicyName1

Declared entities

AccountIP

Related content

Links established from declared identifiers and solution manifests.

Source provenance

GitHub

Displayed values come from files in Azure/Azure-Sentinel. They describe the published template, not your workspace configuration.

Source identifier
a694e977-740c-4578-9f8f-5e39029f1d23
Additional source files 2Solutions/Amazon Web Services/Analytic Rules/AWS_CreatedEC2PolicytoPrivilegeEscalation.yamlsource ↗Solutions/Amazon Web Services/Data/Solution_AmazonWebServices.jsonsolution-membership ↗
GSTEP / CATALOG TRACKING

Added to catalog : 16 Sept 2026 · 05:49 UTC
Last change observed : 16 Sept 2026 · 05:49 UTC

GSTEP sync dates, separate from the source content’s publication dates.