Breaking down MITRE ATT&CK

MITRE Adversarial Tactics, Techniques, and Common Knowledge (ATT&CK) is a threat modeling framework that classifies the tactics and techniques that adversaries use to intrude into and launch cyberattacks on enterprises, clouds, and industrial control systems (ICSs). The MITRE ATT&CK matrix maps the techniques used in various stages of the attack life cycle and provides remediation recommendations for mitigating the attacks.

MITRE ATT&CK describes how adversaries can intrude into networks and then move laterally, escalate privileges, and generally evade your defenses. To help enterprises step up their defenses, the ATT&CK matrix approaches cyberattacks from the adversaries' perspective: who they are, what their objectives are, and the specific methods each adversary group employs. In MITRE ATT&CK, a tactic refers to the high-level goals of an adversary, whereas a technique is a specific method or approach that an adversary employs to achieve their high-level goals.

Who uses MITRE ATT&CK and why?

Private and public sector businesses of all sizes and in a variety of sectors have adopted MITRE ATT&CK. Red teams, cyber-threat intelligence teams, penetration testers, and internal teams looking to develop secure systems and services are just a few examples of its users.

According to VMware, some of the users of MITRE ATT&CK include:

• Organizations: The designers and engineers of a company's security platforms use this framework to assess the performance of their systems, find bugs, and predict how their systems will act in the event of a cyberattack.
• Red teams: In order to find vulnerabilities in their organization's systems and to enhance their capacity to mitigate attacks, red teams employ the MITRE ATT&CK framework. This is accomplished by obtaining insights into how attackers breach the network, acquire access, navigate the compromised network, and employ covert techniques. This allows a business to understand its security posture better and identify and prioritize security vulnerabilities depending on the risk they pose.
• Threat hunters: By using MITRE ATT&CK, threat hunters can map observed behavior to specific tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) used by known threat actors; identify gaps in their defenses; and develop effective detection and response strategies. MITRE ATT&CK also enables threat hunters to communicate their findings and analysis to others in the security community in a standardized way, making it easier to share knowledge and collaborate on threat intelligence.

How does the MITRE ATT&CK framework help?

The framework shows the possible steps an attacker could have taken to attack the organization, enabling security teams to act quickly and appropriately to mitigate the damage of a cyberattack.

Enterprise ATT&CK

This is a sub-framework within the MITRE ATT&CK framework that focuses specifically on TTPs used in attacks against enterprise environments. The sub-framework covers a wide range of tactics involved in attacks against enterprises, including initial access, execution, persistence, privilege escalation, defense evasion, credential access, discovery, lateral movement, collection, exfiltration, and command and control. Enterprise ATT&CK can be used by security professionals to identify potential attack vectors and improve their defenses, by red teams to develop and execute realistic attack simulations, and by incident responders to quickly identify the tactics and techniques used in an attack and develop effective response strategies.

Here are some mitigation recommendations that might help organizations improve their defenses:

• Establish strong perimeter security: Use firewalls, IDSs and IPSs, and other security tools to protect the perimeter of your network and prevent unauthorized access.
• Keep software and systems up to date: Ensure that all software and systems are up to date with the latest security patches and updates to reduce the risk of known vulnerabilities being exploited.
• Monitor for suspicious activity: Use network- and host-based monitoring tools to detect unusual activity, such as abnormal login attempts or suspicious network traffic. This can help you identify potential attacks before they cause damage.

Mobile ATT&CK

This is a sub-framework within the MITRE ATT&CK framework that focuses specifically on TTPs used in attacks against mobile devices. The sub-framework covers a wide range of tactics involved in mobile device attacks (including network attacks, physical attacks, and app attacks). Mobile ATT&CK also covers techniques that attackers may use to compromise mobile devices, such as data manipulation, hooking, impair defenses, and location tracking. Additionally, this sub-framework includes mitigations that may be used to detect and respond to mobile device attacks.

Here are some mitigation recommendations that might help organizations improve their defenses:

• Implement strong access controls: Use strong authentication methods, such as biometrics or multi-factor authentication, to prevent unauthorized access to mobile devices.
• Use mobile device management (MDM) solutions: MDM solutions can help organizations manage and secure mobile devices by enforcing security policies, controlling device settings, and monitoring device activity.
• Keep devices and software up to date: Ensure that all mobile devices and software are up to date with the latest security patches and updates to reduce the risk of known vulnerabilities being exploited.

ICS ATT&CK

This is a sub-framework within the MITRE ATT&CK framework that focuses specifically on TTPs used in attacks against ICSs. ICSs are computer-based systems used to monitor and control physical processes, such as those used in manufacturing, energy production, and other critical infrastructures. ICS ATT&CK includes a wide range of tactics involved in ICS attacks, including initial access, persistence, lateral movement, and impact. The sub-framework also covers a range of mitigations that may be used to detect and respond to ICS attacks, including IDSs and IPSs, network segmentation, and incident response planning. It is intended to help organizations better understand the unique risks and challenges associated with securing ICS environments.

Here are some mitigation recommendations that might help organizations improve their defenses:

• Use IDSs and IPSs: Implement IDSs and IPSs to detect and block malicious network traffic and prevent unauthorized access.
• Use anomaly detection: Implement anomaly detection and analysis tools to identify unusual activity or behavior, which may indicate a potential security incident.
• Use secure communication protocols: Use secure communication protocols, such as SSH or TLS, to encrypt data in transit.

How can Log360's implementation of MITRE ATT&CK help?

Log360, when implemented with MITRE ATT&CK, helps IT security teams boost the effectiveness of their security mechanisms so they can keep up with new and sophisticated security threats. Using this framework, organizations can widen their security capabilities to facilitate early detection and effective incident response.

Log360 can help you by:

• Providing security analytics dashboards and incident reports on techniques covered in the matrix.
• Establishing predefined correlation rules for the ATT&CK techniques so the security admins can track down the entire attack plot with the real-time, rule-based correlation engine.
• Providing mitigation steps to stop ATT&CK techniques at every stage and ensure accountability in threat resolution.
• Facilitating extensive incident investigations. Log360 provides holistic visibility into the 14 ATT&CK tactics and their corresponding techniques through its security analytics dashboards.
• Expediting effective threat resolution. Log360's attack detection module is integrated with ATT&CK's incident management framework for speedy resolution.

To summarize, MITRE ATT&CK is a powerful tool for improving an organization's security posture and enhancing its ability to detect and respond to attacks. By understanding the TTPs used by attackers and implementing appropriate mitigation strategies, organizations can better protect their systems, networks, and data.