ShegerdDongleV478MSCo

Hunt Hypothesis

This hypothesis targets the presence of the ShegerdDongleV478MSCo YARA signature, which likely indicates a specific malware implant or custom tooling used for initial access or persistence. Proactively hunting for this indicator in Azure Sentinel allows the SOC to identify compromised endpoints or suspicious file artifacts before the adversary can establish a foothold or execute further lateral movement within the environment.

YARA Rule

rule ShegerdDongleV478MSCo
{
      meta:
		author="malware-lu"
strings:
		$a0 = { E8 32 00 00 00 B8 [4] 8B 18 C1 CB 05 89 DA 36 8B 4C 24 0C }

condition:
		$a0 at pe.entry_point
}

Deployment Notes

This YARA rule can be deployed in the following contexts:

• Microsoft Defender for Endpoint — Custom indicators / advanced hunting
• Email Gateway — Attachment scanning
• File Share Monitoring — Periodic scanning of shared drives
• YARA CLI — Manual threat hunting on endpoints

This rule contains 1 string patterns in its detection logic.

• Source Rule

False Positive Guidance

• Scenario: A legacy Java-based enterprise application (e.g., Oracle EBS or SAP NetWeaver) uses a proprietary JAR file for license validation that contains a hardcoded string matching the YARA signature ShegerdDongleV478MSCo within its bytecode or resource bundle.
  • Filter/Exclusion: Exclude files located in specific application directories (e.g., C:\Program Files\Oracle\Middleware\jre\lib\) or filter by file extension .jar and .class if the YARA rule is scanning memory or disk files.
• Scenario: A scheduled maintenance job for a third-party backup solution (e.g., Veeam or Commvault) executes a helper executable that embeds a unique build identifier string ShegerdDongleV478MSCo in its version resource or PE header, which is picked up by the YARA scan during routine file integrity checks.
  • Filter/Exclusion: Exclude processes or files owned by known service accounts (e.g., svc_backup, vss_writer) or specific paths like C:\Program Files\Commvault\Gateway\ and C:\Program Files\Veeam\Backup and Replication\.
• Scenario: An IT admin runs a custom PowerShell script to deploy a new internal tool, and the script downloads a compressed archive (.zip or .7z) that contains a metadata file or embedded certificate with the string ShegerdDongleV478MSCo as part of a vendor-specific build tag, triggering the rule during the extraction or download phase.
  • Filter/Exclusion: Exclude files with extensions .zip, .7z, .rar, or .cab if the rule is configured to scan archives, or filter by parent process powershell.exe or tar.exe when the file