Privileged Process Integrity focuses on defending highly privileged processes (e.g., system services, antivirus, or authentication processes) from tampering, injection, or compromise by adversaries. These processes often interact with critical components, making them prime targets for techniques like code injection, privilege escalation, and process manipulation.

• Enable RunAsPPL on Windows systems to protect LSASS and other critical processes.
• Use registry modifications to enforce protected process settings: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa\RunAsPPL Anti-Injection and Memory Protection:.
• Enable Control Flow Guard (CFG), DEP, and ASLR to protect against process memory tampering.
• Deploy endpoint protection tools that actively block process injection attempts.

• Implement policies for Windows Defender Application Control (WDAC) or AppLocker to enforce execution of signed binaries.
• Ensure critical processes are signed with valid certificates.

• Use DACLs and MIC to limit which users and processes can interact with privileged processes.
• Disable unnecessary debugging capabilities for high-privileged processes.

• Ensure Kernel Patch Protection (PatchGuard) is enabled on Windows systems.
• Leverage SELinux or AppArmor on Linux to enforce kernel-level security policies.

• RunAsPPL (Windows)

• Windows Defender Application Control (WDAC)
• AppLocker.

• Control Flow Guard (CFG), Data Execution Prevention (DEP), ASLR Process Isolation/Sandboxing:.
• Firejail (Linux Sandbox)
• Windows Sandbox.

• PatchGuard (Windows Kernel Patch Protection)
• SELinux (Mandatory Access Control for Linux)
• AppArmor.

Credential Access Protection focuses on implementing measures to prevent adversaries from obtaining credentials, such as passwords, hashes, tokens, or keys, that could be used for unauthorized access. This involves restricting access to credential storage mechanisms, hardening configurations to block credential dumping methods, and using monitoring tools to detect suspicious credential-related activity.

• Use Case: Prevent adversaries from accessing the SAM (Security Account Manager) database on Windows systems.
• Implementation: Enforce least privilege principles and restrict administrative access to credential stores such as C:\Windows\System32\config\SAM.

• Use Case: Isolate LSASS (Local Security Authority Subsystem Service) memory to prevent credential dumping.
• Implementation: Enable Windows Defender Credential Guard on enterprise endpoints to isolate secrets and protect them from unauthorized access.

• Use Case: Detect and block known tools like Mimikatz or Windows Credential Editor.
• Implementation: Flag suspicious process behavior related to credential dumping.

• Use Case: Prevent adversaries from exploiting cached credentials on endpoints.
• Implementation: Configure group policy to reduce or eliminate the use of cached credentials (e.g., set Interactive logon: Number of previous logons to cache to 0).

• Use Case: Prevent memory-based attacks used to extract credentials.
• Implementation: Configure Secure Boot and enforce hardware-based security features like DEP (Data Execution Prevention) and ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization).

Restricting library loading involves implementing security controls to ensure that only trusted and verified libraries (DLLs, shared objects, etc.) are loaded into processes. Adversaries often abuse Dynamic-Link Library (DLL) Injection, DLL Search Order Hijacking, or LD_PRELOAD mechanisms to execute malicious code by forcing the operating system to load untrusted libraries.

• Enable SafeDLLSearchMode on Windows.
• Restrict LD_PRELOAD and LD_LIBRARY_PATH usage on Linux systems.

• Require digital signatures for all libraries loaded into processes.
• Use tools like Signtool, and WDAC to enforce signed DLL execution.

• Secure library paths and directories to prevent adversaries from placing rogue libraries.
• Monitor user-writable directories and system configurations for unauthorized changes.

• Enable Sysmon on Windows to monitor for suspicious library loads.
• Use auditd on Linux to monitor shared library paths and configuration file changes.

• Implement AppLocker, WDAC, or SELinux to allow only trusted libraries.

• AppLocker: Application whitelisting for DLLs.
• Windows Defender Application Control (WDAC): Restrict unauthorized library execution.
• Signtool: Verify and enforce code signing.
• Sysmon: Monitor DLL load events (Event ID 7).

• auditd: Monitor changes to library paths and critical files.
• SELinux/AppArmor: Define policies to restrict library loading.
• ldconfig and chattr: Secure LD configuration files and prevent unauthorized modifications.

• Wazuh or OSSEC: File integrity monitoring for library changes.
• Tripwire: Detect and alert on unauthorized library modifications.