SpyEye X.Y Plugins memory

Hunt Hypothesis

The detection identifies potential memory-based execution of SpyEye X.Y plugins, which could indicate adversary use of in-memory attack techniques to evade traditional detection. SOC teams should proactively hunt for this behavior in Azure Sentinel to identify and mitigate advanced threats that leverage memory-resident payloads.

YARA Rule

rule spyeye_plugins : banker
{
	meta:
		author = "Jean-Philippe Teissier / @Jipe_"
		description = "SpyEye X.Y Plugins memory"
		date = "2012-05-23" 
		version = "1.0" 
		filetype = "memory"

	strings:
		$a = "webfakes.dll"
		$b = "config.dat"			//may raise some FP
		$c = "collectors.txt"
		$d = "webinjects.txt"
		$e = "screenshots.txt"
		$f = "billinghammer.dll"
		$g = "block.dll"			//may raise some FP
		$h = "bugreport.dll"		//may raise some FP
		$i = "ccgrabber.dll"
		$j = "connector2.dll"
		$k = "creditgrab.dll"
		$l = "customconnector.dll"
		$m = "ffcertgrabber.dll"
		$n = "ftpbc.dll"
		$o = "rdp.dll"				//may raise some FP
		$p = "rt_2_4.dll"
		$q = "socks5.dll"			//may raise some FP
		$r = "spySpread.dll"
		$s = "w2chek4_4.dll"
		$t = "w2chek4_6.dll"
	
	condition:
		any of them
}

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 20 string patterns in its detection logic.

• Source Rule

False Positive Guidance

• Scenario: System updates or patches using Windows Update or Group Policy
  Filter/Exclusion: Check for ProcessName containing wuauclt.exe, gpupdate.exe, or msiexec.exe
  Rationale: These processes are commonly used for system updates and may trigger memory-related detections.

• Scenario: PowerShell scripts running scheduled tasks for system maintenance
  Filter/Exclusion: Filter by ProcessName containing powershell.exe and check for CommandLine containing -Command or -File with known maintenance scripts
  Rationale: Legitimate PowerShell scripts used for system cleanup or configuration may be flagged due to memory activity.

• Scenario: SQL Server memory management or query execution
  Filter/Exclusion: Filter by ProcessName containing sqlservr.exe or sqlagent.exe
  Rationale: SQL Server processes use significant memory and may trigger memory-related detection rules during query execution or memory allocation.

• Scenario: Log management tools like Splunk or ELK Stack processing large log files
  Filter/Exclusion: Check for ProcessName containing splunkd.exe, logstash.exe, or java.exe (for Elasticsearch)
  Rationale: These tools often use substantial memory when ingesting or processing large volumes of log data.

• Scenario: Virtualization tools such as VMware Tools or Hyper-V managing guest memory
  Filter/Exclusion: Filter by ProcessName containing vmtoolsd.exe, vmware.exe, or svchost.exe (for Hyper-V)
  Rationale: Virtualization tools dynamically manage memory and may trigger memory-related alerts during guest VM operations.