Attack Ent T1098 007 Additional Local Or Domain Groups

MITRE ATT&CK T1098.007: Additional Local or Domain Groups

When to use this skill

Use this skill when the task involves T1098.007, Additional Local or Domain Groups, enterprise ATT&CK, TTP mapping, detection engineering, hunting, incident-response enrichment, control validation, or authorized adversary-emulation planning. Treat it as a defensive analysis aid: keep outputs focused on understanding, detecting, mitigating, and safely validating this ATT&CK sub-technique.

Technique context

• ATT&CK domain: enterprise
• ATT&CK ID: T1098.007
• Technique name: Additional Local or Domain Groups
• Type: sub-technique
• ATT&CK URL: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1098/007
• Tactics: persistence, privilege-escalation
• Platforms: Windows, macOS, Linux
• Required permissions: Not specified
• Effective permissions: Not specified
• Defenses bypassed: Not specified

ATT&CK description

An adversary may add additional local or domain groups to an adversary-controlled account to maintain persistent access to a system or domain.

On Windows, accounts may use the net localgroup and net group commands to add existing users to local and domain groups.(Citation: Microsoft Net Localgroup)(Citation: Microsoft Net Group) On Linux, adversaries may use the usermod command for the same purpose.(Citation: Linux Usermod)

For example, accounts may be added to the local administrators group on Windows devices to maintain elevated privileges. They may also be added to the Remote Desktop Users group, which allows them to leverage Remote Desktop Protocol to log into the endpoints in the future.(Citation: Microsoft RDP Logons) Adversaries may also add accounts to VPN user groups to gain future persistence on the network.(Citation: Cyber Security News) On Linux, accounts may be added to the sudoers group, allowing them to persistently leverage Sudo and Sudo Caching for elevated privileges.

In Windows environments, machine accounts may also be added to domain groups. This allows the local SYSTEM account to gain privileges on the domain.(Citation: RootDSE AD Detection 2022)

Agent workflow

1. Clarify scope: identify the system, asset class, log sources, cloud or endpoint platform, and whether the user wants triage, detection, coverage assessment, or safe emulation planning.
2. Load bundled resources as needed: use references/technique-profile.json for structured metadata, references/detection-and-mitigation.md for triage and telemetry guidance, references/known-threat-context.md for ATT&CK relationship context, and templates/ for repeatable outputs.
3. Map observations to ATT&CK: compare the user's evidence to the ATT&CK description, tactics, platforms, and known procedure patterns before asserting a match.
4. Produce defensive outputs: prioritize hypotheses, telemetry requirements, detection logic ideas, validation steps, containment guidance, and mitigations.
5. Preserve uncertainty: distinguish confirmed evidence, plausible indicators, assumptions, and gaps. Recommend what to collect next.
6. Stay safe: do not provide malware, credential theft, persistence, evasion, destructive automation, or unauthorized exploitation instructions. For adversary emulation, keep steps bounded to approved lab or control-validation contexts and omit operational abuse details.

Bundled resources

• references/technique-profile.json: machine-readable ATT&CK metadata for this technique.
• references/detection-and-mitigation.md: detection notes, telemetry checklist, triage questions, mitigation candidates, and false-positive considerations.
• references/known-threat-context.md: ATT&CK relationship context with attribution cautions.
• templates/detection-brief.md: detection engineering brief template.
• templates/hunt-plan.md: threat hunt plan template.
• templates/incident-response-note.md: incident response note template.
• templates/coverage-assessment.md: ATT&CK coverage assessment template.
• scripts/render_brief.py: local helper that renders a Markdown defensive brief from technique-profile.json.
• assets/output-schema.json: JSON schema for structured technique analysis outputs.

To generate a quick brief, run python scripts/render_brief.py --output brief.md from inside this skill directory, or adapt the templates directly.

Detection guidance

No ATT&CK detection guidance was present in the source STIX object.

Useful telemetry and data sources

• Not specified in the STIX object.

Mitigations to consider

• No ATT&CK mitigation relationships were present in the source STIX bundle.

Known threat context

Use these examples only as contextual leads, not as proof that an observed event is this technique:

• APT3 (intrusion-set)
• APT41 (intrusion-set)
• APT5 (intrusion-set)
• DarkGate (malware)
• Dragonfly (intrusion-set)
• FIN13 (intrusion-set)
• Kimsuky (intrusion-set)
• Magic Hound (intrusion-set)
• Net (tool)
• SMOKEDHAM (malware)
• ServHelper (malware)

Recommended output pattern

When responding with this skill, structure the answer as:

• Assessment: whether the evidence supports this ATT&CK mapping and why.
• Evidence: specific indicators, logs, behaviors, and assumptions.
• Detection: telemetry sources, analytic logic, and tuning considerations.
• Response: containment, eradication, recovery, and validation actions.
• Coverage gaps: missing logs, sensors, controls, or environmental details.
• References: include the ATT&CK URL and any user-provided evidence references.

ATT&CK contributors

• Madhukar Raina (Senior Security Researcher - Hack The Box, UK)