↳ GitHub sourceAnalytics ruleMedium

AWSCloudTrail - Creation of SSM policy and then privilege escalation

Description

Identifies creation of IAM policies that grant broad AWS Systems Manager permissions followed by attachment to a user, role, or group. This sequence can indicate an attempt to gain administration capabilities that support privilege escalation.
Rule type
Scheduled
Version
1.0.3
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 = materialize(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 = 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 "ssm:*" or Action contains "ssm:Create*" or Action contains "ssm:CreateAssociation") and Resource == "*" and Condition == ""
| distinct TimeGenerated, EventName, PolicyName, SourceIpAddress, UserIdentityArn, RecipientAccountId, AccountName, AccountUPNSuffix
| project-rename StartTime = TimeGenerated;
let PolicyAttach = 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
aaa2c05e-fdd4-4fa0-9072-6cffe3641b34
Additional source files 2Solutions/Amazon Web Services/Analytic Rules/AWS_CreatedSSMPolicytoPrivilegeEscalation.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.