EnigmaProtector11X13XSukhovVladimirSergeNMarkin

Hunt Hypothesis

This detection identifies the presence of the EnigmaProtector11X13XSukhovVladimirSergeNMarkin YARA signature, which likely indicates the execution or file staging of a specific obfuscation tool or custom malware variant associated with these identifiers. Proactively hunting for this pattern in Azure Sentinel is essential to uncover potential early-stage adversary activity that may utilize this specific protection mechanism to evade standard detection baselines before escalating its impact.

YARA Rule

rule EnigmaProtector11X13XSukhovVladimirSergeNMarkin
{
      meta:
		author="malware-lu"
strings:
		$a0 = { 55 8B EC 83 C4 F0 B8 00 10 40 00 E8 01 00 00 00 9A 83 C4 10 8B E5 5D E9 }

condition:
		$a0
}

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

Here are 5 specific false positive scenarios for the EnigmaProtector11X13XSukhovVladimirSergeNMarkin detection rule, including suggested filters and exclusions tailored for a legitimate enterprise environment:

• Scenario: Automated Endpoint Protection Scans

  • Context: The YARA signature may match the heuristic scanning engine of major EDR solutions when they perform deep file system scans on protected directories.
  • Specific Tool: Microsoft Defender for Endpoint or CrowdStrike Falcon performing scheduled “On-Demand” scans.
  • Filter/Exclusion: Exclude processes where ProcessName is MsMpEng.exe (Defender) or CsAgent.exe (CrowdStrike) and the parent process is the respective service host, specifically when running in non-interactive mode during maintenance windows.

• Scenario: Enterprise Software Deployment via Configuration Management

  • Context: The rule triggers when configuration management tools install or update software packages that contain embedded scripts matching the EnigmaProtector signature structure.
  • Specific Tool: Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) or Ansible Tower executing deployment jobs for internal line-of-business applications.
  • Filter/Exclusion: Create an exclusion based on ParentProcessName being ccmexec.exe (SCCM) or ansible-runner, and restrict the rule to only alert if the file path is outside of standard application installation directories (e.g., exclude paths starting with C:\Program Files\Microsoft Configuration Manager).

• Scenario: Scheduled Backup and Archiving Operations

  • Context: Backup agents often compress and encrypt data streams that mimic the binary structure detected by the EnigmaProtector logic, causing false hits during nightly jobs.
  • Specific Tool: Veeam Backup & Replication or Commvault running scheduled “Full” backup jobs on file