Back to results

AWS Lateral Movement from Kubernetes SA via AssumeRoleWithWebIdentity

Detects when credentials issued through `AssumeRoleWithWebIdentity` for a Kubernetes service account identity are later used for several distinct AWS control-plane actions on the same session access key. Workloads…

Description

Detects when credentials issued through `AssumeRoleWithWebIdentity` for a Kubernetes service account identity are later used for several distinct AWS control-plane actions on the same session access key. Workloads that use EKS IAM Roles for Service Accounts routinely exchange a projected service-account token for short-lived IAM credentials; this rule highlights sessions where that exchange is followed by a spread of sensitive APIs—reconnaissance, secrets and parameter access, IAM changes, or compute creation—beyond what routine pod traffic usually shows. High-volume S3 object reads and writes are excluded from the correlation set to reduce noise from normal data-plane work.

Detection logic

Its licence does not clear it for publishing here

Sunturai publishes a detection's own text where the licence it arrived under has been reviewed and permits it, and Elastic License 2.0 has not. The query as its source wrote it, its canonical form and the hash that pins this revision are in the workspace record.

Detection requirements

Platform
ContainersESXiIaaSIdentity ProviderLinuxmacOSOffice SuiteSaaSWindows

The rule states no platform. This is derived from the 4 ATT&CK techniques it maps to.

Known benign triggers

  • In-cluster automation may produce the same pattern: validate `Esql.user_name_values`, workload ownership, and whether `source.ip` / `source.as.organization.name` match expected egress before tuning or allowlisting.

Detections can measure how the public catalogue is used — which detections people look for, and which pages bring them here. It sets a cookie that recognises this browser for 180 days. It is never linked to an account and never follows you to other sites. Privacy notice