Process Primary Token Elevated to SeDebugPrivilege
Description
This query detects when a process's primary token is modified to include SeDebugPrivilege (privilege bit 20). SeDebugPrivilege grants a process the ability to open and manipulate any other process on the system, regardless of its security descriptor. This privilege is routinely abused by attackers for credential dumping (e.g., accessing LSASS), process injection, and lateral movement. The query uses a bitmask comparison to identify exactly when this privilege is added to a token and enriches the result with file prevalence data to reduce false positives.
Query · kql
// Token elevated to SeDebugPriv let SeDebugPriv = binary_shift_left(1, 20); DeviceEvents | where Timestamp > ago(7d) | where ActionType == 'ProcessPrimaryTokenModified' | extend CurrentTokenPrivEnabled = tolong(parse_json(AdditionalFields).CurrentTokenPrivEnabled), OriginalTokenPrivEnabled = tolong(parse_json(AdditionalFields).OriginalTokenPrivEnabled) | extend PrivilegeDiff = binary_xor(OriginalTokenPrivEnabled, CurrentTokenPrivEnabled) | where PrivilegeDiff == SeDebugPriv | invoke FileProfile(InitiatingProcessSHA256) | project-reorder Timestamp, ActionType, InitiatingProcessFileName, InitiatingProcessSHA256, InitiatingProcessFolderPath, GlobalPrevalence, GlobalFirstSeen, InitiatingProcessCommandLine