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Entra ID Application Self-Assigned to Privileged Role

Identifies an Entra ID application (service principal) assigning itself to a privileged directory role. An application typically does not promote itself, and a multi-tenant vendor application is even more uncommon.…

Description

Identifies an Entra ID application (service principal) assigning itself to a privileged directory role. An application typically does not promote itself, and a multi-tenant vendor application is even more uncommon. Any service principal self-assigning a privileged role should be investigated. Adversaries may compromise vendor application credentials and then escalate privileges to Exchange Administrator or Global Administrator, or subsequently add client secrets to other applications.

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.

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Detection requirements

Platform
ContainersESXiIaaSIdentity ProviderLinuxmacOSNetwork DevicesOffice SuiteSaaSWindows

The rule states no platform. This is derived from the 2 ATT&CK techniques it maps to.

Known benign triggers

  • Local automation or provisioning applications that are designed to assign roles to themselves. Review the owner and purpose, then exclude by application ID.
  • Vendor onboarding or reconfiguration where a consented third-party management or backup application is deliberately granted a directory role by its own setup workflow. Confirm with the application owner and the change record, then exclude the specific application ID.

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