Correlating Threat Campaigns

Correlating Threat Campaigns

Overview

Cybersecurity skill for correlating threat campaigns. Follows industry best practices and security standards.

When to Use

Trigger phrases:

• "correlating threat campaigns"
• "Multiple unrelated-appearing incidents share IOCs (same C2 IP, same malware hash"
• "An ISAC partner shares indicators from an incident that match your own historica"
• "Building a campaign report linking adversary activity over weeks or months to a"

Use this skill when:

• Multiple unrelated-appearing incidents share IOCs (same C2 IP, same malware hash, similar TTPs)
• An ISAC partner shares indicators from an incident that match your own historical events
• Building a campaign report linking adversary activity over weeks or months to a single operation

Do not use this skill to force correlation based on weak signals — false campaign attribution misleads defenders and wastes resources on incorrect threat models.

When NOT to Use

• When you lack proper authorization for testing
• For production systems without change management
• When the task requires legal or compliance expertise beyond technical scope

Prerequisites

• TIP or SIEM with historical indicator and event data (90+ days recommended)
• MISP correlation engine enabled with event sharing configured
• Graph analysis tool (Maltego, Neo4j, or OpenCTI) for relationship visualization
• Reference to MITRE ATT&CK intrusion set and campaign objects for structuring output

Workflow

# Example: IOC detection
import re

IOC_PATTERNS = {
    "ip": r"\b(?:\d{1,3}\.){3}\d{1,3}\b",
    "domain": r"\b[a-z0-9-]+\.[a-z]{2,}\b",
    "hash_md5": r"\b[a-f0-9]{32}\b",
    "hash_sha256": r"\b[a-f0-9]{64}\b",
}

def extract_iocs(text: str) -> dict:
    return {k: re.findall(v, text) for k, v in IOC_PATTERNS.items()}

1. Define Objectives — Clarify the goals and scope for threat campaigns.
2. Gather Resources — Collect tools, data, and access needed for threat campaigns.
3. Execute Process — Carry out threat campaigns operations methodically.
4. Verify Quality — Check results against acceptance criteria.
5. Document Outcomes — Record findings, decisions, and next steps.

Tools

• Analysis Platform — Data processing and visualization
• Collaboration Tools — Team coordination and knowledge sharing

Process

1. Research — Analyze target audience, competitors, and trending topics
2. Create — Generate content following brand guidelines and best practices
3. Publish & Optimize — Distribute to target platforms, track performance, iterate

Verification

• All threat campaigns procedures executed completely and documented
• Findings validated against multiple data sources
• False positives identified and filtered
• Results documented with evidence and timestamps
• Recommendations provided with risk-based prioritization

Anti-Rationalization Table