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April 2, 2024

Darktrace's Investigation of Raspberry Robin Worm

Discover how Darktrace is leading the hunt for Raspberry Robin. Explore early insights and strategies in the battle against cyber threats.
Written by
Alexandra Sentenac
Cyber Analyst
Inside the SOC
Darktrace cyber analysts are world-class experts in threat intelligence, threat hunting and incident response, and provide 24/7 SOC support to thousands of Darktrace customers around the globe. Inside the SOC is exclusively authored by these experts, providing analysis of cyber incidents and threat trends, based on real-world experience in the field.
Written by
Alexandra Sentenac
Cyber Analyst
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02
Apr 2024

Introduction

In the face of increasingly hardened digital infrastructures and skilled security teams, malicious actors are forced to constantly adapt their attack methods, resulting in sophisticated attacks that are designed to evade human detection and bypass traditional network security measures.  

One such example that was recently investigated by Darktrace is Raspberry Robin, a highly evasive worm malware renowned for merging existing and novel techniques, as well as leveraging both physical hardware and software, to establish a foothold within organization’s networks and propagate additional malicious payloads.

What is Raspberry Robin?

Raspberry Robin, also known as ‘QNAP worm’, is a worm malware that was initially discovered at the end of 2023 [1], however, its debut in the threat landscape may have predated this, with Microsoft uncovering malicious artifacts linked to this threat (which it tracks under the name Storm-0856) dating back to 2019 [4]. At the time, little was known regarding Raspberry Robin’s objectives or operators, despite the large number of successful infections worldwide. While the identity of the actors behind Raspberry Robin still remains a mystery, more intelligence has been gathered about the malware and its end goals as it was observed delivering payloads from different malware families.

Who does Raspberry Robin target?

While it was initially reported that Raspberry Robin primarily targeted the technology and manufacturing industries, researchers discovered that the malware had actually targeted multiple sectors [3] [4]. Darktrace’s own investigations echoed this, with Raspberry Robin infections observed across various industries, including public administration, finance, manufacturing, retail education and transportation.

How does Raspberry Robin work?

Initially, it appeared that Raspberry Robin's access to compromised networks had not been utilized to deliver final-stage malware payloads, nor to steal corporate data. This uncertainty led researchers to question whether the actors involved were merely “cybercriminals playing around” or more serious threats [3]. This lack of additional exploitation was indeed peculiar, considering that attackers could easily escalate their attacks, given Raspberry Robin’s ability to bypass User Account Control using legitimate Windows tools [4].

However, at the end of July 2022, some clarity emerged regarding the operators' end goals. Microsoft researchers revealed that the access provided by Raspberry Robin was being utilized by an access broker tracked as DEV-0206 to distribute the FakeUpdates malware downloader [2]. Researchers further discovered malicious activity associated with Evil Corp TTPs (i.e., DEV-0243) [5] and payloads from the Fauppod malware family leveraging Raspberry Robin’s access [8]. This indicates that Raspberry Robin may, in fact, be an initial access broker, utilizing its presence on hundreds of infected networks to distribute additional payloads for paying malware operators. Thus far, Raspberry Robin has been observed distributing payloads linked to FIN11, Clop Gang, BumbleBee, IcedID, and TrueBot on compromised networks [12].

Raspberry Robin’s Continued Evolution

Since it first appeared in the wild, Raspberry Robin has evolved from "being a widely distributed worm with no observed post-infection actions [...] to one of the largest malware distribution platforms currently active" [8]. The fact that Raspberry Robin has become such a prevalent threat is likely due to the continual addition of new features and evasion capabilities to their malware [6] [7].  

Since its emergence, the malware has “changed its communication method and lateral movement” [6] in order to evade signature detections based on threat intelligence and previous versions. Endpoint security vendors commonly describe it as heavily obfuscated malware, employing multiple layers of evasion techniques to hinder detection and analysis. These include for example dropping a fake payload when analyzed in a sandboxed environment and using mixed-case executing commands, likely to avoid case-sensitive string-based detections.  

In more recent campaigns, Raspberry Robin further appears to have added a new distribution method as it was observed being downloaded from archive files sent as attachments using the messaging service Discord [11]. These attachments contained a legitimate and signed Windows executable, often abused by attackers for side-loading, alongside a malicious dynamic-link library (DLL) containing a Raspberry Robin sample.

Another reason for the recent success of the malware may be found in its use of one-day exploits. According to researchers, Raspberry Robin now utilizes several local privilege escalation exploits that had been recently disclosed, even before a proof of concept had been made available [9] [10]. This led cyber security professionals to believe that operators of the malware may have access to an exploit seller [6]. The use of these exploits enhances Raspberry Robin's detection evasion and persistence capabilities, enabling it to propagate on networks undetected.

Darktrace’s Coverage of Raspberry Robin

Through two separate investigations carried out by Darktrace’s Threat Research team, first in late 2022 and then in November 2023, it became evident that Raspberry Robin was capable of integrating new functionalities and tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) into its attacks. Darktrace DETECT™ provided full visibility over the evolving campaign activity, allowing for a comparison of the threat across both investigations. Additionally, if Darktrace RESPOND™ was enabled on affected networks, it was able to quickly mitigate and contain emerging activity during the initial stages, thwarting the further escalation of attacks.

Raspberry Robin Initial Infection

The most prevalent initial infection vector appears to be the introduction of an infected external drive, such as a USB stick, containing a malicious .LNK file (i.e., a Windows shortcut file) disguised as a thumb drive or network share. When clicked, the LNK file automatically launches cmd.exe to execute the malicious file stored on the external drive, and msiexec.exe to connect to a Raspberry Robin command-and-control (C2) endpoint and download the main malware component. The whole process leverages legitimate Windows processes and is therefore less likely to raise any alarms from more traditional security solutions. However, Darktrace DETECT was able to identify the use of Msiexec to connect to a rare endpoint as anomalous in every case investigated.

Little is currently known regarding how the external drives are infected and distributed, but it has been reported that affected USB drives had previously been used for printing at printing and copying shops, suggesting that the infection may have originated from such stores [13].

A method as simple as leaving an infected USB on a desk in a public location can be a highly effective social engineering tactic for attackers. Exploiting both curiosity and goodwill, unsuspecting individuals may innocently plug in a found USB, hoping to identify its owner, unaware that they have unwittingly compromised their device.

As Darktrace primarily operates on the network layer, the insertion of a USB endpoint device would not be within its visibility. Nevertheless, Darktrace did observe several instances wherein multiple Microsoft endpoints were contacted by compromised devices prior to the first connection to a Raspberry Robin domain. For example, connections to the URI '/fwlink/?LinkID=252669&clcid=0x409' were observed in multiple customer environments prior to the first Raspberry Robin external connection. This connectivity seems to be related to Windows attempting to retrieve information about installed hardware, such as a printer, and could also be related to the inserting of an external USB drive.

Figure 1: Device Event Log showing an affected device making connections to Microsoft endpoints, prior to contacting the Raspberry Robin C2 endpoint ‘vqdn[.]net’.
Figure 1: Device Event Log showing an affected device making connections to Microsoft endpoints, prior to contacting the Raspberry Robin C2 endpoint ‘vqdn[.]net’.

Raspberry Robin Command-and-Control Activity

In all cases investigated by Darktrace, compromised devices were detected making HTTP GET connections via the unusual port 8080 to Raspberry Robin C2 endpoints using the new user agent 'Windows Installer'.

The C2 hostnames observed were typically short and matched the regex /[a-zA-Z0-9]{2,4}.[a-zA-Z0-9]{2,6}/, and were hosted on various top-level domains (TLD) such as ‘.rocks’, ‘.pm’, and ‘.wf’. On one customer network, Darktrace observed the download of an MSI file from the Raspberry Robin domain ‘wak[.]rocks’. This package contained a heavily protected malicious DLL file whose purpose was unknown at the time.  

However, in September 2022, external researchers revealed that the main purpose of this DLL was to download further payloads and enable lateral movement, persistence and privilege escalation on compromised devices, as well as exfiltrating sensitive information about the device. As worm infections spread through networks automatically, exfiltrating device data is an essential process for threat actor to keep track of which systems have been infected.

On affected networks investigated by Darktrace, compromised devices were observed making C2 connections that contained sensitive device information, including hostnames and credentials, with additional host information likely found within the data packets [12].

Figure 2: Model Breach Event Log displaying the events that triggered the the ‘New User Agent and Suspicious Request Data’ DETECT model breach.
Figure 2: Model Breach Event Log displaying the events that triggered the the ‘New User Agent and Suspicious Request Data’ DETECT model breach.

As for C2 infrastructure, Raspberry Robin leverages compromised Internet of Things (IoT) devices such as QNAP network attached storage (NAS) systems with hijacked DNS settings [13]. NAS devices are data storage servers that provide access to the files they store from anywhere in the world. These features have been abused by Raspberry Robin operators to distribute their malicious payloads, as any uploaded file could be stored and shared easily using NAS features.

However, Darktrace found that QNAP servers are not the only devices being exploited by Raspberry Robin, with DETECT identifying other IoT devices being used as C2 infrastructure, including a Cerio wireless access point in one example. Darktrace recognized that this connection was new to the environment and deemed it as suspicious, especially as it also used new software and an unusual port for the HTTP protocol (i.e., 8080 rather than 80).

In several instances, Darktrace observed Raspberry Robin utilizing TOR exit notes as backup C2 infrastructure, with compromised devices detected connecting to TOR endpoints.

Figure 3: Raspberry Robin C2 endpoint when viewed in a sandbox environment.
Figure 3: Raspberry Robin C2 endpoint when viewed in a sandbox environment.
Figure 4: Raspberry Robin C2 endpoint when viewed in a sandbox environment.
Figure 4: Raspberry Robin C2 endpoint when viewed in a sandbox environment.

Raspberry Robin in 2022 vs 2023

Despite the numerous updates and advancements made to Raspberry Robin between the investigations carried out in 2022 and 2023, Darktrace’s detection of the malware was largely the same.

DETECT models breached during first investigation at the end of 2022:

  • Device / New User Agent
  • Anomalous Server Activity / New User Agent from Internet Facing System
  • Device / New User Agent and New IP
  • Compromise / Suspicious Request Data
  • Compromise / Uncommon Tor Usage
  • Possible Tor Usage

DETECT models breached during second investigation in late 2023:

  • Device / New User Agent and New IP
  • Device / New User Agent and Suspicious Request Data
  • Device / New User Agent
  • Device / Suspicious Domain
  • Possible Tor Usage

Darktrace’s anomaly-based approach to threat detection enabled it to consistently detect the TTPs and IoCs associated with Raspberry Robin across the two investigations, despite the operator’s efforts to make it stealthier and more difficult to analyze.

In the first investigation in late 2022, Darktrace detected affected devices downloading addition executable (.exe) files following connections to the Raspberry Robin C2 endpoint, including a numeric executable file that appeared to be associated with the Vidar information stealer. Considering the advanced evasion techniques and privilege escalation capabilities of Raspberry Robin, early detection is key to prevent the malware from downloading additional malicious payloads.

In one affected customer environment investigated in late 2023, a total of 12 devices were compromised between mid-September and the end of October. As this particular customer did not have Darktrace RESPOND, the Raspberry Robin infection was able to spread through the network unabated until the customer acted upon Darktrace DETECT’s alerts.

Had Darktrace RESPOND been enabled in autonomous response mode, it would have been able to take immediate action following the first observed connection to a Raspberry Robin C2 endpoint, by blocking connections to the suspicious endpoint and enforcing a device’s normal ‘pattern of life’.

By enforcing a pattern of life on an affected device, RESPOND would prevent it from carrying out any activity that deviates from this learned pattern, including connections to new endpoints using new software as was the case in Figure 5, effectively shutting down the attack in the first instance.

Model Breach Event Log showing RESPOND’s actions against connections to Raspberry Robin C2 endpoints.
Figure 5: Model Breach Event Log showing RESPOND’s actions against connections to Raspberry Robin C2 endpoints.

Conclusion

Raspberry Robin is a highly evasive and adaptable worm known to evolve and change its TTPs on a regular basis in order to remain undetected on target networks for as long as possible. Due to its ability to drop additional malware variants onto compromised devices, it is crucial for organizations and their security teams to detect Raspberry Robin infections at the earliest possible stage to prevent the deployment of potentially disruptive secondary attacks.

Despite its continued evolution, Darktrace's detection of Raspberry Robin remained largely unchanged across the two investigations. Rather than relying on previous IoCs or leveraging existing threat intelligence, Darktrace DETECT’s anomaly-based approach allows it to identify emerging compromises by detecting the subtle deviations in a device’s learned behavior that would typically come with a malware compromise.

By detecting the attacks at an early stage, Darktrace gave its customers full visibility over malicious activity occurring on their networks, empowering them to identify affected devices and remove them from their environments. In cases where Darktrace RESPOND was active, it would have been able to take autonomous follow-up action to halt any C2 communication and prevent the download of any additional malicious payloads.  

Credit to Alexandra Sentenac, Cyber Analyst, Trent Kessler, Senior Cyber Analyst, Victoria Baldie, Director of Incident Management

Appendices

Darktrace DETECT Model Coverage

Device / New User Agent and New IP

Device / New User Agent and Suspicious Request Data

Device / New User Agent

Compromise / Possible Tor Usage

Compromise / Uncommon Tor Usage

MITRE ATT&CK Mapping

Tactic - Technique

Command & Control - T1090.003 Multi-hop Proxy

Lateral Movement - T1210 Exploitation of remote services

Exfiltration over C2 Data - T1041 Exfiltration over C2 Channel

Data Obfuscation - T1001 Data Obfuscation

Vulnerability Scanning - T1595.002 Vulnerability Scanning

Non-Standard Port - T1571 Non-Standard Port

Persistence - T1176 Browser Extensions

Initial Access - T1189 Drive By Compromise / T1566.002  Spearphishing Link

Collection - T1185 Man in the browser

List of IoCs

IoC - Type - Description + Confidence

vqdn[.]net - Hostname - C2 Server

mwgq[.]net - Hostname - C2 Server

wak[.]rocks - Hostname - C2 Server

o7car[.]com - Hostname - C2 Server

6t[.]nz - Hostname - C2 Server

fcgz[.]net - Hostname - Possible C2 Server

d0[.]wf - Hostname - C2 Server

e0[.]wf - Hostname - C2 Server

c4z[.]pl - Hostname - C2 Server

5g7[.]at - Hostname - C2 Server

5ap[.]nl - Hostname - C2 Server

4aw[.]ro - Hostname - C2 Server

0j[.]wf - Hostname - C2 Server

f0[.]tel - Hostname - C2 Server

h0[.]pm - Hostname - C2 Server

y0[.]pm - Hostname - C2 Server

5qy[.]ro - Hostname - C2 Server

g3[.]rs - Hostname - C2 Server

5qe8[.]com - Hostname - C2 Server

4j[.]pm - Hostname - C2 Server

m0[.]yt - Hostname - C2 Server

zk4[.]me - Hostname - C2 Server

59.15.11[.]49 - IP address - Likely C2 Server

82.124.243[.]57 - IP address - C2 Server

114.32.120[.]11 - IP address - Likely C2 Server

203.186.28[.]189 - IP address - Likely C2 Server

70.124.238[.]72 - IP address - C2 Server

73.6.9[.]83 - IP address - Likely C2 Server

References

[1] https://redcanary.com/blog/raspberry-robin/  

[2] https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/microsoft-links-raspberry-robin-malware-to-evil-corp-attacks/

[3] https://7095517.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/7095517/FLINT%202022-016%20-%20QNAP%20worm_%20who%20benefits%20from%20crime%20(1).pdf

[4] https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/microsoft-finds-raspberry-robin-worm-in-hundreds-of-windows-networks/

[5] https://therecord.media/microsoft-ties-novel-raspberry-robin-malware-to-evil-corp-cybercrime-syndicate

[6] https://securityaffairs.com/158969/malware/raspberry-robin-1-day-exploits.html

[7] https://research.checkpoint.com/2024/raspberry-robin-keeps-riding-the-wave-of-endless-1-days/

[8] https://redmondmag.com/articles/2022/10/28/microsoft-details-threat-actors-leveraging-raspberry-robin-worm.aspx

[9] https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/raspberry-robin-malware-evolves-with-early-access-to-windows-exploits/

[10] https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/raspberry-robin-worm-drops-fake-malware-to-confuse-researchers/

[11] https://thehackernews.com/2024/02/raspberry-robin-malware-upgrades-with.html

[12] https://decoded.avast.io/janvojtesek/raspberry-robins-roshtyak-a-little-lesson-in-trickery/

[13] https://blog.bushidotoken.net/2023/05/raspberry-robin-global-usb-malware.html

Written by
Alexandra Sentenac
Cyber Analyst
Inside the SOC
Darktrace cyber analysts are world-class experts in threat intelligence, threat hunting and incident response, and provide 24/7 SOC support to thousands of Darktrace customers around the globe. Inside the SOC is exclusively authored by these experts, providing analysis of cyber incidents and threat trends, based on real-world experience in the field.
Written by
Alexandra Sentenac
Cyber Analyst

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July 17, 2025

Introducing the AI Maturity Model for Cybersecurity

AI maturity model for cybersecurityDefault blog imageDefault blog image

AI adoption in cybersecurity: Beyond the hype

Security operations today face a paradox. On one hand, artificial intelligence (AI) promises sweeping transformation from automating routine tasks to augmenting threat detection and response. On the other hand, security leaders are under immense pressure to separate meaningful innovation from vendor hype.

To help CISOs and security teams navigate this landscape, we’ve developed the most in-depth and actionable AI Maturity Model in the industry. Built in collaboration with AI and cybersecurity experts, this framework provides a structured path to understanding, measuring, and advancing AI adoption across the security lifecycle.

Overview of AI maturity levels in cybersecurity

Why a maturity model? And why now?

In our conversations and research with security leaders, a recurring theme has emerged:

There’s no shortage of AI solutions, but there is a shortage of clarity and understanding of AI uses cases.

In fact, Gartner estimates that “by 2027, over 40% of Agentic AI projects will be canceled due to escalating costs, unclear business value, or inadequate risk controls. Teams are experimenting, but many aren’t seeing meaningful outcomes. The need for a standardized way to evaluate progress and make informed investments has never been greater.

That’s why we created the AI Security Maturity Model, a strategic framework that:

  • Defines five clear levels of AI maturity, from manual processes (L0) to full AI Delegation (L4)
  • Delineating the outcomes derived between Agentic GenAI and Specialized AI Agent Systems
  • Applies across core functions such as risk management, threat detection, alert triage, and incident response
  • Links AI maturity to real-world outcomes like reduced risk, improved efficiency, and scalable operations

[related-resource]

How is maturity assessed in this model?

The AI Maturity Model for Cybersecurity is grounded in operational insights from nearly 10,000 global deployments of Darktrace's Self-Learning AI and Cyber AI Analyst. Rather than relying on abstract theory or vendor benchmarks, the model reflects what security teams are actually doing, where AI is being adopted, how it's being used, and what outcomes it’s delivering.

This real-world foundation allows the model to offer a practical, experience-based view of AI maturity. It helps teams assess their current state and identify realistic next steps based on how organizations like theirs are evolving.

Why Darktrace?

AI has been central to Darktrace’s mission since its inception in 2013, not just as a feature, but the foundation. With over a decade of experience building and deploying AI in real-world security environments, we’ve learned where it works, where it doesn’t, and how to get the most value from it. This model reflects that insight, helping security leaders find the right path forward for their people, processes, and tools

Security teams today are asking big, important questions:

  • What should we actually use AI for?
  • How are other teams using it — and what’s working?
  • What are vendors offering, and what’s just hype?
  • Will AI ever replace people in the SOC?

These questions are valid, and they’re not always easy to answer. That’s why we created this model: to help security leaders move past buzzwords and build a clear, realistic plan for applying AI across the SOC.

The structure: From experimentation to autonomy

The model outlines five levels of maturity :

L0 – Manual Operations: Processes are mostly manual with limited automation of some tasks.

L1 – Automation Rules: Manually maintained or externally-sourced automation rules and logic are used wherever possible.

L2 – AI Assistance: AI assists research but is not trusted to make good decisions. This includes GenAI agents requiring manual oversight for errors.

L3 – AI Collaboration: Specialized cybersecurity AI agent systems  with business technology context are trusted with specific tasks and decisions. GenAI has limited uses where errors are acceptable.

L4 – AI Delegation: Specialized AI agent systems with far wider business operations and impact context perform most cybersecurity tasks and decisions independently, with only high-level oversight needed.

Each level reflects a shift, not only in technology, but in people and processes. As AI matures, analysts evolve from executors to strategic overseers.

Strategic benefits for security leaders

The maturity model isn’t just about technology adoption it’s about aligning AI investments with measurable operational outcomes. Here’s what it enables:

SOC fatigue is real, and AI can help

Most teams still struggle with alert volume, investigation delays, and reactive processes. AI adoption is inconsistent and often siloed. When integrated well, AI can make a meaningful difference in making security teams more effective

GenAI is error prone, requiring strong human oversight

While there is a lot of hype around GenAI agentic systems, teams will need to account for inaccuracy and hallucination in Agentic GenAI systems.

AI’s real value lies in progression

The biggest gains don’t come from isolated use cases, but from integrating AI across the lifecycle, from preparation through detection to containment and recovery.

Trust and oversight are key initially but evolves in later levels

‍Early-stage adoption keeps humans fully in control. By L3 and L4, AI systems act independently within defined bounds, freeing humans for strategic oversight.

People’s roles shift meaningfully

As AI matures, analyst roles consolidate and elevate from labor intensive task execution to high-value decision-making, focusing on critical, high business impact activities, improving processes and AI governance.

Outcome, not hype, defines maturity

AI maturity isn’t about tech presence, it’s about measurable impact on risk reduction, response time, and operational resilience.

[related-resource]

Outcomes across the AI Security Maturity Model

The Security Organization experiences an evolution of cybersecurity outcomes as teams progress from manual operations to AI delegation. Each level represents a step-change in efficiency, accuracy, and strategic value.

L0 – Manual Operations

At this stage, analysts manually handle triage, investigation, patching, and reporting manually using basic, non-automated tools. The result is reactive, labor-intensive operations where most alerts go uninvestigated and risk management remains inconsistent.

L1 – Automation Rules

At this stage, analysts manage rule-based automation tools like SOAR and XDR, which offer some efficiency gains but still require constant tuning. Operations remain constrained by human bandwidth and predefined workflows.

L2 – AI Assistance

At this stage, AI assists with research, summarization, and triage, reducing analyst workload but requiring close oversight due to potential errors. Detection improves, but trust in autonomous decision-making remains limited.

L3 – AI Collaboration

At this stage, AI performs full investigations and recommends actions, while analysts focus on high-risk decisions and refining detection strategies. Purpose-built agentic AI systems with business context are trusted with specific tasks, improving precision and prioritization.

L4 – AI Delegation

At this stage, Specialized AI Agent Systems performs most security tasks independently at machine speed, while human teams provide high-level strategic oversight. This means the highest time and effort commitment activities by the human security team is focused on proactive activities while AI handles routine cybersecurity tasks

Specialized AI Agent Systems operate with deep business context including impact context to drive fast, effective decisions.

Join the webinar

Get a look at the minds shaping this model by joining our upcoming webinar using this link. We’ll walk through real use cases, share lessons learned from the field, and show how security teams are navigating the path to operational AI safely, strategically, and successfully.

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Ashanka Iddya
Senior Director, Product Marketing

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July 17, 2025

Forensics or Fauxrensics: Five Core Capabilities for Cloud Forensics and Incident Response

people working and walking in officeDefault blog imageDefault blog image

The speed and scale at which new cloud resources can be spun up has resulted in uncontrolled deployments, misconfigurations, and security risks. It has had security teams racing to secure their business’ rapid migration from traditional on-premises environments to the cloud.

While many organizations have successfully extended their prevention and detection capabilities to the cloud, they are now experiencing another major gap: forensics and incident response.

Once something bad has been identified, understanding its true scope and impact is nearly impossible at times. The proliferation of cloud resources across a multitude of cloud providers, and the addition of container and serverless capabilities all add to the complexities. It’s clear that organizations need a better way to manage cloud incident response.

Security teams are looking to move past their homegrown solutions and open-source tools to incorporate real cloud forensics capabilities. However, with the increased buzz around cloud forensics, it can be challenging to decipher what is real cloud forensics, and what is “fauxrensics.”

This blog covers the five core capabilities that security teams should consider when evaluating a cloud forensics and incident response solution.

[related-resource]

1. Depth of data

There have been many conversations among the security community about whether cloud forensics is just log analysis. The reality, however, is that cloud forensics necessitates access to a robust dataset that extends far beyond traditional log data sources.

While logs provide valuable insights, a forensics investigation demands a deeper understanding derived from multiple data sources, including disk, network, and memory, within the cloud infrastructure. Full disk analysis complements log analysis, offering crucial context for identifying the root cause and scope of an incident.

For instance, when investigating an incident involving a Kubernetes cluster running on an EC2 instance, access to bash history can provide insights into the commands executed by attackers on the affected instance, which would not be available through cloud logs alone.

Having all of the evidence in one place is also a capability that can significantly streamline investigations, unifying your evidence be it disk images, memory captures or cloud logs, into a single timeline allowing security teams to reconstruct an attacks origin, path and impact far more easily. Multi–cloud environments also require platforms that can support aggregating data from many providers and services into one place. Doing this enables more holistic investigations and reduces security blind spots.

There is also the importance of collecting data from ephemeral resources in modern cloud and containerized environments. Critical evidence can be lost in seconds as resources are constantly spinning up and down, so having the ability to capture this data before its gone can be a huge advantage to security teams, rather than having to figure out what happened after the affected service is long gone.

darktrace / cloud, cado, cloud logs, ost, and memory information. value of cloud combined analysis

2. Chain of custody

Chain of custody is extremely critical in the context of legal proceedings and is an essential component of forensics and incident response. However, chain of custody in the cloud can be extremely complex with the number of people who have access and the rise of multi-cloud environments.

In the cloud, maintaining a reliable chain of custody becomes even more complex than it already is, due to having to account for multiple access points, service providers and third parties. Having automated evidence tracking is a must. It means that all actions are logged, from collection to storage to access. Automation also minimizes the chance of human error, reducing the risk of mistakes or gaps in evidence handling, especially in high pressure fast moving investigations.

The ability to preserve unaltered copies of forensic evidence in a secure manner is required to ensure integrity throughout an investigation. It is not just a technical concern, its a legal one, ensuring that your evidence handling is documented and time stamped allows it to stand up to court or regulatory review.

Real cloud forensics platforms should autonomously handle chain of custody in the background, recording and safeguarding evidence without human intervention.

3. Automated collection and isolation

When malicious activity is detected, the speed at which security teams can determine root cause and scope is essential to reducing Mean Time to Response (MTTR).

Automated forensic data collection and system isolation ensures that evidence is collected and compromised resources are isolated at the first sign of malicious activity. This can often be before an attacker has had the change to move latterly or cover their tracks. This enables security teams to prevent potential damage and spread while a deeper-dive forensics investigation takes place. This method also ensures critical incident evidence residing in ephemeral environments is preserved in the event it is needed for an investigation. This evidence may only exist for minutes, leaving no time for a human analyst to capture it.

Cloud forensics and incident response platforms should offer the ability to natively integrate with incident detection and alerting systems and/or built-in product automation rules to trigger evidence capture and resource isolation.

4. Ease of use

Security teams shouldn’t require deep cloud or incident response knowledge to perform forensic investigations of cloud resources. They already have enough on their plates.

While traditional forensics tools and approaches have made investigation and response extremely tedious and complex, modern forensics platforms prioritize usability at their core, and leverage automation to drastically simplify the end-to-end incident response process, even when an incident spans multiple Cloud Service Providers (CSPs).

Useability is a core requirement for any modern forensics platform. Security teams should not need to have indepth knowledge of every system and resource in a given estate. Workflows, automation and guidance should make it possible for an analyst to investigate whatever resource they need to.

Unifying the workflow across multiple clouds can also save security teams a huge amount of time and resources. Investigations can often span multiple CSP’s. A good security platform should provide a single place to search, correlate and analyze evidence across all environments.

Offering features such as cross cloud support, data enrichment, a single timeline view, saved search, and faceted search can help advanced analysts achieve greater efficiency, and novice analysts are able to participate in more complex investigations.

5. Incident preparedness

Incident response shouldn't just be reactive. Modern security teams need to regularly test their ability to acquire new evidence, triage assets and respond to threats across both new and existing resources, ensuring readiness even in the rapidly changing environments of the cloud.  Having the ability to continuously assess your incident response and forensics workflows enables you to rapidly improve your processes and identify and mitigate any gaps identified that could prevent the organization from being able to effectively respond to potential threats.

Real forensics platforms deliver features that enable security teams to prepare extensively and understand their shortcomings before they are in the heat of an incident. For example, cloud forensics platforms can provide the ability to:

  • Run readiness checks and see readiness trends over time
  • Identify and mitigate issues that could prevent rapid investigation and response
  • Ensure the correct logging, management agents, and other cloud-native tools are appropriately configured and operational
  • Ensure that data gathered during an investigation can be decrypted
  • Verify that permissions are aligned with best practices and are capable of supporting incident response efforts

Cloud forensics with Darktrace

Darktrace delivers a proactive approach to cyber resilience in a single cybersecurity platform, including cloud coverage. Darktrace / CLOUD is a real time Cloud Detection and Response (CDR) solution built with advanced AI to make cloud security accessible to all security teams and SOCs. By using multiple machine learning techniques, Darktrace brings unprecedented visibility, threat detection, investigation, and incident response to hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

Darktrace’s cloud offerings have been bolstered with the acquisition of Cado Security Ltd., which enables security teams to gain immediate access to forensic-level data in multi-cloud, container, serverless, SaaS, and on-premises environments.

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About the author
Calum Hall
Technical Content Researcher
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