MITRE ATT&CK technique
T1078 — Valid Accounts
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T1078 (Valid Accounts) is a MITRE ATT&CK technique tracked in WhisperGraph, serving the Stealth, Persistence, Privilege Escalation, Initial Access tactics.
Description
Adversaries may obtain and abuse credentials of existing accounts as a means of gaining Initial Access, Persistence, Privilege Escalation, or Defense Evasion. Compromised credentials may be used to bypass access controls placed on various resources on systems within the network and may even be used for persistent access to remote systems and externally available services, such as VPNs, Outlook Web Access, network devices, and remote desktop.(Citation: volexity_0day_sophos_FW) Compromised credentials may also grant an adversary increased privilege to specific systems or access to restricted areas of the network. Adversaries may choose not to use malware or tools in conjunction with the legitimate access those credentials provide to make it harder to detect their presence. In some cases, adversaries may abuse inactive accounts: for example, those belonging to individuals who are no longer part of an organization. Using these accounts may allow the adversary to evade detection, as the original account user will not be present to identify any anomalous activity taking place on their account.(Citation: CISA MFA PrintNightmare) The overlap of permissions for local, domain, and cloud accounts across a network of systems is of concern because the adversary may be able to pivot across accounts and systems to reach a high level of access (i.e., domain or enterprise administrator) to bypass access controls set within the enterprise.(Citation: TechNet Credential Theft)
Tactics
Related techniques
Threat actors observed using this technique
- Carbanak
- Dragonfly
- INC Ransom
- POLONIUM
- Volt Typhoon
- Axiom
- Akira
- Play
- Indrik Spider
- UNC3886
- Threat Group-3390
- Suckfly
- Scattered Spider
- Ke3chang
- Fox Kitten
- Medusa Group
- menuPass
- FIN10
- BlackByte
- Star Blizzard
- Wizard Spider
- ShinyHunters
- APT41
- Silence
- LAPSUS$
- Silent Librarian
- APT39
- Sandworm Team
- APT33
- TeamPCP
- APT29
- APT28
- GALLIUM
- Cinnamon Tempest
- VOID MANTICORE
- PittyTiger
- OilRig
- FIN4
- FIN5
- Leviathan
- FIN6
- FIN7
- FIN8
- Sea Turtle
- APT18
- Chimera
- Lazarus Group
- WIZARD SPIDER
- Void Manticore
- INDRIK SPIDER
© The MITRE Corporation. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of The MITRE Corporation.
Related pages
Pivot from T1078 into its tactic, related techniques and the actors that use it.
Queries
Resolves the segment to this technique or tactic.
MATCH (t:ATTACK_PATTERN {name: $id})
RETURN t.id AS id, t.name AS name, t.kind AS kind, t.description AS descriptionThe tactic(s) this technique serves.
MATCH (t:ATTACK_PATTERN {name: $id})-[:USES_TACTIC]->(tac:ATTACK_PATTERN)
RETURN tac.id AS id, tac.name AS name
LIMIT 10This id's parent technique, if it is a sub-technique.
MATCH (p:ATTACK_PATTERN {name: $parentId})
RETURN p.id AS id, p.name AS name
LIMIT 1Sub-techniques of this technique, if any.
MATCH (c:ATTACK_PATTERN) WHERE c.id STARTS WITH $subPrefix
RETURN c.id AS id, c.name AS name
ORDER BY c.id
LIMIT 25Threat actors observed using this technique.
MATCH (a:ACTOR)-[:USES_TECHNIQUE]->(t:ATTACK_PATTERN {name: $id})
RETURN a.name AS name
LIMIT 100Or query Whisper from your own LLM workflow via the Whisper MCP server.