Understanding MITRE's ATT&CK Framework

Oct 27, 2024

MITRE's ATT&CK Framework

Overview

  • Adversary Challenges
    • Adversaries typically remain undetected on networks for months after a breach.
    • Understanding adversarial penetration, movement, and objectives is crucial for defense.

ATT&CK Framework by MITRE

  • Describes how adversaries infiltrate networks, move laterally, escalate privileges, and evade defenses.
  • Provides perspective from the adversary's point of view, outlining their goals and methods.

Tactics and Techniques

  • Tactics: Specific technical objectives that attackers aim to achieve.
    • Examples include:
      • Defense Evasion
      • Lateral Movement
      • Exfiltration
  • Techniques: Various methods an adversary might use to achieve each tactic.
    • Techniques vary based on adversary expertise, tool availability, and system configuration.
    • Each technique includes:
      • Description of the method.
      • Applicable systems or platforms.
      • Known adversary groups using the technique.
      • Mitigation strategies.
      • References to real-world usage.

Benefits of ATT&CK

  • Understanding Adversary Operations
    • Helps in planning detection and prevention strategies.
    • Provides insights into adversary preparation and execution stages.
  • Detection Enhancement
    • Framework aids in developing analytics for detecting adversary techniques.

Adversary Group Information

  • ATT&CK maintains a library of adversary groups and their campaigns.
  • Based on real-world data, allowing correlation of adversaries with techniques.

Technology Domains

  • ATT&CK is segmented into domains covering:
    • Enterprise networks (Windows, Linux)
    • Mobile devices

Community and Collaboration

  • MITRE fosters a community around ATT&CK for knowledge refinement and sharing.
  • A conflict-free environment is maintained for creating and managing information.

Conclusion

  • ATT&CK helps organizations understand adversaries, evaluate defenses, and improve security.
  • MITRE provides resources and solutions in cyber threat intelligence for a safer world.