ThreatFox: SmartApeSG IOCs

Hunt Hypothesis

The ThreatFox: SmartApeSG IOCs rule detects potential adversary activity linked to the SmartApeSG threat group, which is associated with malicious network traffic and data exfiltration. SOC teams should proactively hunt for these IOCs in Azure Sentinel to identify and mitigate early-stage compromise by a sophisticated threat actor leveraging known malicious infrastructure.

IOC Summary

Malware Family: SmartApeSG Total IOCs: 3 IOC Types: domain, url

KQL: Domain Hunt

// Hunt for DNS queries to known malicious domains
// Source: ThreatFox - SmartApeSG
let malicious_domains = dynamic(["saffronecho.top"]);
DnsEvents
| where Name has_any (malicious_domains)
| project TimeGenerated, Computer, Name, IPAddresses, QueryType
| order by TimeGenerated desc

KQL: Url Hunt

// Hunt for access to known malicious URLs
// Source: ThreatFox - SmartApeSG
let malicious_urls = dynamic(["https://saffronecho.top/redirect/gateway-util", "https://saffronecho.top/redirect/middleware-validator.js"]);
UrlClickEvents
| where Url has_any (malicious_urls)
| project Timestamp, AccountUpn, Url, ActionType, IsClickedThrough
| order by Timestamp desc

Required Data Sources

References

• ThreatFox — SmartApeSG

False Positive Guidance

• Scenario: Legitimate scheduled job for system maintenance using smartape tool
  Filter/Exclusion: process.name != "smartape" or process.parent.name != "task scheduler"

• Scenario: Admin performing a system audit using the smartape command-line tool
  Filter/Exclusion: process.user != "admin" or process.command_line contains "audit"

• Scenario: Automated backup script that uses smartape for data transfer
  Filter/Exclusion: process.command_line contains "backup" or process.parent.name != "backup service"

• Scenario: System update process that includes smartape as part of a patching tool
  Filter/Exclusion: process.command_line contains "update" or process.parent.name != "patch manager"

• Scenario: User running a legitimate third-party application that includes smartape as a dependency
  Filter/Exclusion: process.name != "legitimate_app" or process.parent.name != "explorer.exe"