Alloy4xPGWareLLC

Hunt Hypothesis

This rule detects the presence of the Alloy4xPGWareLLC YARA signature, which indicates a specific malware strain or implant often associated with targeted intrusion campaigns. Proactively hunting for this indicator allows the SOC team to identify compromised endpoints early in the kill chain, enabling rapid containment before the adversary can establish persistence or execute lateral movement within the Azure environment.

YARA Rule

rule Alloy4xPGWareLLC
{
      meta:
		author="malware-lu"
strings:
		$a0 = { 9C 60 E8 02 00 00 00 33 C0 8B C4 83 C0 04 93 8B E3 8B 5B FC 81 EB 07 30 40 00 87 DD 6A 04 68 00 10 00 00 68 00 02 00 00 6A 00 FF 95 A8 33 40 00 0B C0 0F 84 F6 01 00 00 89 85 2E 33 40 00 83 BD E8 32 40 00 01 74 0D 83 BD E4 32 40 00 01 74 2A 8B F8 EB 3E 68 }

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 .NET-based internal reporting tool (e.g., SalesDashboard.exe) is deployed via GPO to all finance department workstations. The binary was compiled with an older version of the .NET Framework and contains specific string literals or byte patterns that match the Alloy4xPGWareLLC YARA signature, causing it to be flagged as malware on every endpoint.

  • Filter/Exclusion: Add an exclusion for the specific file path C:\Program Files\InternalTools\SalesDashboard\SalesDashboard.exe and verify the digital signature is valid from the internal CA. Alternatively, exclude by SHA256 hash if the binary is immutable.

• Scenario: An IT administrator runs a custom PowerShell script (Update-AppConfig.ps1) to patch configuration files for a proprietary inventory management system. The script downloads a small, unsigned helper DLL (ConfigUpdater.dll) from the internal file server to perform the update. This DLL is a known good binary but lacks a strong name signature, triggering the YARA rule on the endpoint where the script executes.

  • Filter/Exclusion: Exclude the specific directory C:\Temp\InventoryUpdate\ or the specific DLL name ConfigUpdater.dll when the parent process is powershell.exe or pwsh.exe. Ensure the file server path is whitelisted in the EDR policy.

• Scenario: A developer on the engineering team runs a local instance of a custom Java-based microservice (OrderProcessor.jar) using a standalone JRE. The JRE installation includes a native library (jvm.dll or similar) that has a specific memory layout or string pattern matching the Alloy4xPGWareLLC rule. This occurs because the JRE version is slightly outdated and hasn’t been updated to the latest patch level.

  • Filter/Exclusion: Exclude processes named `