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HighElastic detection rulesAryu Zaw

Potential EDR-Freeze via WerFaultSecure Abuse

Identifies the Windows Error Reporting Protected Process Light (PPL) binary WerFaultSecure.exe being started by a process other than the Windows Error Reporting service, with command-line arguments used to take a…

Description

Identifies the Windows Error Reporting Protected Process Light (PPL) binary WerFaultSecure.exe being started by a process other than the Windows Error Reporting service, with command-line arguments used to take a secure memory dump of a target process. Because MiniDumpWriteDump suspends all threads of the target while the dump is produced, an attacker can suspend WerFaultSecure.exe mid-dump to leave the targeted EDR or antivirus suspended ("frozen") without ever terminating it, a defense-evasion technique publicly known as EDR-Freeze.

Detection logic

Its licence does not clear it for publishing here

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Detection requirements

Platform
ContainersESXiIaaSIdentity ProviderLinuxmacOSNetwork DevicesOffice SuiteWindows

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

Log source category
event_index

Known benign triggers

  • Specialized crash-analysis, debugging, or diagnostics tooling that invokes WerFaultSecure.exe directly to capture a secure process dump. Validate the parent process, its code signature, and the targeted process before adding an exception.

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