T1546.009: AppCert DLLs
Essential information
- MITRE technique ID
T1546.009- Confidence
- 100/100
- Revoked
- No
- Published
- 24/01/2020 15:47
- Modified
- 27/03/2026 01:10
- Author / Source
- The MITRE Corporation
Platforms
windows
Description
Adversaries may establish persistence and/or elevate privileges by executing malicious content triggered by AppCert DLLs loaded into processes. Dynamic-link libraries (DLLs) that are specified in the `AppCertDLLs` Registry key under `HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\` are loaded into every process that calls the ubiquitously used application programming interface (API) functions `CreateProcess`, `CreateProcessAsUser`, `CreateProcessWithLoginW`, `CreateProcessWithTokenW`, or `WinExec`. (Citation: Elastic Process Injection July 2017)
Similar to [Process Injection](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1055), this value can be abused to obtain elevated privileges by causing a malicious DLL to be loaded and run in the context of separate processes on the computer. Malicious AppCert DLLs may also provide persistence by continuously being triggered by API activity.
Kill chain phases
| Kill chain | Phase |
|---|---|
| mitre-attack | persistence |
| mitre-attack | privilege-escalation |
Marking (TLP)
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