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T1606.002: T1606.002

View on MITRE ATT&CK The MITRE Corporation · Published 17/12/2020 16:24 · Modified 04/06/2026 11:39

Essential information

MITRE technique ID
T1606.002
Confidence
100/100
Revoked
No
Published
17/12/2020 16:24
Modified
04/06/2026 11:39
Author / Source
The MITRE Corporation

Aliases

SAML Tokens

Platforms

windows IaaS Office Suite Identity Provider SaaS

Description

An adversary may forge SAML tokens with any permissions claims and lifetimes if they possess a valid SAML token-signing certificate.(Citation: Microsoft SolarWinds Steps) The default lifetime of a SAML token is one hour, but the validity period can be specified in the `NotOnOrAfter` value of the `conditions ...` element in a token. This value can be changed using the `AccessTokenLifetime` in a `LifetimeTokenPolicy`.(Citation: Microsoft SAML Token Lifetimes) Forged SAML tokens enable adversaries to authenticate across services that use SAML 2.0 as an SSO (single sign-on) mechanism.(Citation: Cyberark Golden SAML) An adversary may utilize [Private Keys](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1552/004) to compromise an organization's token-signing certificate to create forged SAML tokens. If the adversary has sufficient permissions to establish a new federation trust with their own Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) server, they may instead generate their own trusted token-signing certificate.(Citation: Microsoft SolarWinds Customer Guidance) This differs from [Steal Application Access Token](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1528) and other similar behaviors in that the tokens are new and forged by the adversary, rather than stolen or intercepted from legitimate users. An adversary may gain administrative Entra ID privileges if a SAML token is forged which claims to represent a highly privileged account. This may lead to [Use Alternate Authentication Material](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1550), which may bypass multi-factor and other authentication protection mechanisms.(Citation: Microsoft SolarWinds Customer Guidance)

Kill chain phases

Kill chainPhase
mitre-attack credential-access

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