Comprehensive Analysis of EDR Systems' Performance in MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Enterprise Evaluations

Основні поняття

The MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Enterprise Evaluations provide valuable insights into the detection and protection capabilities of endpoint detection and response (EDR) systems against real-world advanced persistent threat (APT) attacks. This study presents a comprehensive analysis of the evaluation results to uncover the strengths and limitations of mainstream EDR products.

Анотація

The researchers conducted a thorough analysis of the MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Enterprise Evaluation datasets to gain deeper insights into the performance of EDR systems. Key highlights of the analysis include:

Whole-graph Analysis:

• Constructed causal relationship attack graphs to examine EDR systems' attack reconstruction and behavior correlation capabilities.
• Found that most EDR systems can see the connections between attack steps, but many struggle to effectively aggregate behaviors along the kill chain to provide timely protection.
• Identified practical issues such as delayed protection, lack of protection, and lack of cross-host correlation capability in some EDR systems.

Overall Trend Analysis:

• Observed significant improvements in EDR systems' data collection and detection coverage over the years, with 75% of systems identifying more than 80% of attack steps in the latest evaluation.
• Discovered large discrepancies in visibility for the same technique across different evaluations, suggesting techniques are too coarse-grained as a unit for detection coverage analysis.
• Proposed new metrics like detection confidence and quality to capture additional aspects of EDR performance beyond the existing MITRE metrics.
• Analyzed trends in detection coverage, confidence, and quality across different techniques and EDR systems over multiple years.
• Examined the data sources used by EDR systems and their compatibility with different platforms.

The comprehensive analysis provides valuable insights to help researchers, practitioners, and vendors better understand the strengths and limitations of mainstream EDR products, guiding future improvements in endpoint security solutions.

Статистика

The EDR market is expected to reach around $3.7 billion by 2023 and is still expanding.
In the Carbanak+Fin7 (2020) evaluation, only around 40% of the EDR systems could detect encrypted channel or application layer protocol communications.
In the Wizard Spider+Sandworm (2022) evaluation, 15 techniques achieved perfect visibility coverage among all EDR systems.
AhnLab's visibility score increased from 0.517 in the Carbanak+Fin7 evaluation to 0.761 in the Wizard Spider+Sandworm evaluation.

Цитати

"Large discrepancies in visibility for the same technique in different evaluations suggest that techniques are still too coarse-grained for detection coverage. A more fine-grained unit, such as generalized technique implementations, is needed."
"Most EDR systems have good data collection capability, and this capability is improving every year. In the most recent Wizard Spider+Sandworm (2022) evaluation, 75% of the EDR systems can identify more than 80% of the attack steps."

Ключові висновки, отримані з

Decoding the MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Enterprise Evaluation: An Analysis of EDR Performance in Real-World Environments

by Xiangmin She... о arxiv.org 04-24-2024

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2401.15878.pdf

Глибші Запити

How can the MITRE ATT&CK framework be further refined to provide a more granular and consistent taxonomy for evaluating EDR systems?

The MITRE ATT&CK framework can be refined in several ways to enhance the evaluation of EDR systems. One approach is to introduce a more fine-grained taxonomy that goes beyond individual techniques to generalized technique implementations. By focusing on generalized implementations, the framework can capture variations in how the same technique is implemented by different threat actors, providing a more nuanced understanding of detection coverage. This refinement would allow for a more detailed assessment of EDR systems' capabilities in detecting a wider range of behaviors associated with specific attack tactics.
Additionally, MITRE could consider incorporating additional categories or subcategories within the framework to address specific aspects of EDR performance. For example, introducing categories related to data source analysis, detection confidence, and detection quality could provide a more comprehensive evaluation of EDR systems. By expanding the taxonomy to include these aspects, evaluators can gain deeper insights into the strengths and limitations of different EDR products.
Furthermore, ensuring consistency in terminology and evaluation metrics across different evaluations is crucial for benchmarking and comparing EDR systems effectively. MITRE could establish standardized definitions for detection categories, modifiers, and performance metrics to promote consistency and facilitate meaningful comparisons between different evaluations. By maintaining a consistent taxonomy and evaluation framework, MITRE can improve the reliability and utility of the ATT&CK framework for evaluating EDR systems.

How can the MITRE ATT&CK framework be further refined to provide a more granular and consistent taxonomy for evaluating EDR systems?

To enhance EDR systems' ability to effectively correlate behaviors across the entire attack kill chain, novel techniques and approaches can be developed. One approach is to leverage advanced machine learning algorithms and artificial intelligence to analyze and correlate diverse data sources in real-time. By employing anomaly detection algorithms, clustering techniques, and predictive analytics, EDR systems can identify patterns and anomalies indicative of malicious behavior across multiple stages of the attack kill chain.
Another strategy is to integrate threat intelligence feeds and contextual information into EDR systems to enrich the correlation analysis. By incorporating external threat intelligence sources, such as indicators of compromise (IOCs) and behavioral analytics, EDR systems can enhance their ability to correlate behaviors and identify sophisticated attack patterns. Additionally, contextual information about the organization's network environment, user behavior, and asset inventory can provide valuable insights for correlating behaviors and detecting anomalies effectively.
Furthermore, the development of graph-based analysis techniques can facilitate the correlation of behaviors across the attack kill chain. By constructing causal relationship attack graphs and analyzing the connectivity and effectiveness of attack steps, EDR systems can gain a holistic view of the attack scenario and improve their response capabilities. Graph-based analysis enables EDR systems to identify relationships between different behaviors, detect hidden attack patterns, and prioritize response actions based on the severity of the threat.

What insights from this analysis of EDR performance could be applied to improve security monitoring and incident response capabilities in other domains beyond endpoint protection?

The insights gained from the analysis of EDR performance can be applied to enhance security monitoring and incident response capabilities in various domains beyond endpoint protection. One key takeaway is the importance of comprehensive interpretation of evaluation results to provide meaningful insights for practitioners, researchers, and vendors. By incorporating whole-graph analysis methodologies and evaluating detection coverage, confidence, and quality, organizations can gain a deeper understanding of their security posture and identify areas for improvement.
Additionally, the emphasis on attack graph-level correlation capabilities and the need for timely and effective response actions can be translated to other domains, such as network security and cloud security. By adopting graph-based analysis techniques and leveraging advanced analytics to correlate behaviors and detect anomalies, organizations can strengthen their security monitoring capabilities and respond proactively to emerging threats.
Furthermore, the focus on data source analysis, compatibility, and trend analysis can inform the development of integrated security monitoring solutions that encompass multiple security domains. By integrating insights from EDR evaluations into a unified security monitoring platform, organizations can enhance their incident response capabilities, streamline threat detection and mitigation processes, and improve overall security resilience across diverse environments.