Excessive user account lockouts

Cortex XDR Analytics Alert Reference by Alert name

Product
Cortex XDR
Last date published
2024-10-08
Category
Analytics Alert Reference
Order
Alert name

Synopsis

Activation Period

14 Days

Training Period

30 Days

Test Period

1 Hour

Deduplication Period

1 Day

Required Data

  • Requires one of the following data sources:
    • Windows Event Collector
      OR
    • XDR Agent with eXtended Threat Hunting (XTH)

Detection Modules

Identity Analytics

Detector Tags

ATT&CK Tactic

Credential Access (TA0006)

ATT&CK Technique

Brute Force (T1110)

Severity

Low

Description

A high amount of user accounts were locked out in a short time period.
This may be the result of a brute-force or password spray attack.

Attacker's Goals

An attacker may be attempting to gain unauthorized access to user accounts.

Investigative actions

  • Investigate the associated authentication attempts and login failures (e.g. 4625, 4776 events).
  • Check if any programs were cached with old credentials, resulting in account lockouts.
  • Find the computer responsible for the lockouts and verify if it exists on the domain.
  • Monitor services that may be running with a user's credentials.

Variations

Excessive user account lockouts from a suspicious source

Synopsis

ATT&CK Tactic

Credential Access (TA0006)

ATT&CK Technique

Brute Force (T1110)

Severity

Medium

Description

A high amount of user accounts were locked out in a short time period.
This may be the result of a brute-force or password spray attack.

Attacker's Goals

An attacker may be attempting to gain unauthorized access to user accounts.

Investigative actions

  • Investigate the associated authentication attempts and login failures (e.g. 4625, 4776 events).
  • Check if any programs were cached with old credentials, resulting in account lockouts.
  • Find the computer responsible for the lockouts and verify if it exists on the domain.
  • Monitor services that may be running with a user's credentials.


Excessive account lockouts on suspicious users

Synopsis

ATT&CK Tactic

Credential Access (TA0006)

ATT&CK Technique

Brute Force (T1110)

Severity

Medium

Description

A high amount of user accounts were locked out in a short time period.
This may be the result of a brute-force or password spray attack.

Attacker's Goals

An attacker may be attempting to gain unauthorized access to user accounts.

Investigative actions

  • Investigate the associated authentication attempts and login failures (e.g. 4625, 4776 events).
  • Check if any programs were cached with old credentials, resulting in account lockouts.
  • Find the computer responsible for the lockouts and verify if it exists on the domain.
  • Monitor services that may be running with a user's credentials.