ThreatFox: Havoc IOCs

Hunt Hypothesis

This detection rule identifies adversary activity involving specific Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) linked to the Havoc post-exploitation framework, which attackers utilize to establish persistent command and control channels within compromised environments. SOC teams should proactively hunt for these IOCs in Azure Sentinel to rapidly detect early-stage lateral movement and data exfiltration attempts before adversaries can fully entrench their presence across the network.

IOC Summary

Malware Family: Havoc Total IOCs: 2 IOC Types: ip:port

KQL: Ip Hunt

// Hunt for network connections to known malicious IPs
// Source: ThreatFox - Havoc
let malicious_ips = dynamic(["107.182.173.199"]);
CommonSecurityLog
| where DestinationIP in (malicious_ips) or SourceIP in (malicious_ips)
| project TimeGenerated, SourceIP, DestinationIP, DestinationPort, DeviceAction, Activity
| order by TimeGenerated desc

KQL: Ip Hunt Device

// Hunt in Defender for Endpoint network events
let malicious_ips = dynamic(["107.182.173.199"]);
DeviceNetworkEvents
| where RemoteIP in (malicious_ips)
| project Timestamp, DeviceName, RemoteIP, RemotePort, InitiatingProcessFileName, ActionType
| order by Timestamp desc

Required Data Sources

References

• ThreatFox — Havoc

False Positive Guidance

Here are specific false positive scenarios and corresponding filters for the ThreatFox: Havoc IOCs detection rule in an enterprise environment:

• Scenario: Scheduled Vulnerability Scans by Internal Security Tools

  • Context: Enterprise vulnerability management platforms (e.g., Tenable Nessus, Qualys, or Rapid7 InsightVM) often perform active network probing. These tools may generate traffic patterns or process executions that match the specific IOCs associated with the Havoc framework, particularly if they utilize similar payload signatures or command-line arguments during asset discovery phases.
  • Suggested Filter/Exclusion: Create a rule exclusion based on the source IP ranges of the vulnerability management servers and the specific executable names (e.g., nessuscli.exe, qualys-pc-agent.exe). Additionally, exclude events occurring within the defined maintenance window (e.g., 02:00–04:00 UTC) where these scans are scheduled.

• Scenario: Automated Patch Deployment via Configuration Management

  • Context: System administrators frequently use tools like Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (MECM/SCCM) or Ansible to deploy patches and updates. During the deployment of specific security agents or framework updates, these tools may invoke scripts that trigger network connections or process behaviors identical to Havoc IOCs, especially when downloading artifacts from internal repositories that share similar hash signatures.
  • Suggested Filter/Exclusion: Implement a filter targeting the parent process name (e.g., ccmsetup.exe for SCCM or ansible-runner) and exclude events where the user context is a known service account (e.g., DOMAIN\SCCM-Deploy-Svc).

• Scenario: Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) Telemetry Collection

  • Context: Modern EDR solutions such as CrowdStrike Falcon, **Microsoft