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T1547.004: Winlogon Helper DLL

View on MITRE ATT&CK The MITRE Corporation · Published 24/01/2020 17:59 · Modified 27/03/2026 01:10

Essential information

MITRE technique ID
T1547.004
Confidence
100/100
Revoked
No
Published
24/01/2020 17:59
Modified
27/03/2026 01:10
Author / Source
The MITRE Corporation

Aliases

T1547.004

Platforms

windows

Description

Adversaries may abuse features of Winlogon to execute DLLs and/or executables when a user logs in. Winlogon.exe is a Windows component responsible for actions at logon/logoff as well as the secure attention sequence (SAS) triggered by Ctrl-Alt-Delete. Registry entries in `HKLM\Software[\\Wow6432Node\\]\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\` and `HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\` are used to manage additional helper programs and functionalities that support Winlogon.(Citation: Cylance Reg Persistence Sept 2013) Malicious modifications to these Registry keys may cause Winlogon to load and execute malicious DLLs and/or executables. Specifically, the following subkeys have been known to be possibly vulnerable to abuse: (Citation: Cylance Reg Persistence Sept 2013) * Winlogon\Notify - points to notification package DLLs that handle Winlogon events * Winlogon\Userinit - points to userinit.exe, the user initialization program executed when a user logs on * Winlogon\Shell - points to explorer.exe, the system shell executed when a user logs on Adversaries may take advantage of these features to repeatedly execute malicious code and establish persistence.

Kill chain phases

Kill chainPhase
mitre-attack persistence
mitre-attack privilege-escalation

Marking (TLP)

TLP:CLEAR Copyright 2015-2025, The MITRE Corporation. MITRE ATT&CK and ATT&CK are registered trademarks of The MITRE Corporation.

External references