Query: Lateral movement indicators for Fileless Storage
Matching passage: T1027.011 Fileless Storage. Tactics: stealth. Description: Adversaries may store data in "fileless" formats to conceal malicious activity from defenses. Fileless storage can be broadly defined as any format other than a file. Common examples of non-volatile fileless storage in Windows systems include the Windows Registry, event logs, or WMI repository.(Citation: Microsoft Fileless)(Citation: SecureList Fileless) Shared memory directories on Linux systems (`/dev/shm`, `/run/shm`, `/var/run`, and `/var/lock`) and volatile directories on Network Devices (`/tmp` and `/volatile`) may also be considered fileless storage, as files written to these directories are mapped directly to RAM and not stored on the disk.(Citation: Elastic Binary Executed from Shared Memory Directory)(Citation: Akami Frog4Shell 2024)(Citation: Aquasec Muhstik Malware 2024)(Citation: Bitsight 7777 Botnet)(Citation: CISCO Nexus 900 Config). Similar to fileless in-memory behaviors such as [Reflective Code Loading](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1620) and [Process Injection](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1055), fileless data storage may remain undetected by antivirus and other endpoint security tools that can only access specific file formats from disk storage. Leveraging fileless storage may also allow adversaries to bypass the protections offered by read-only file systems in Linux.(Citation: Sysdig Fileless Malware 23022) Adversaries may use fileless storage to conceal various types of stored data, including payloads/shellcode (potentially being used as part of [Persistence](https://attack.mitre.org/tactics/TA0003)) and collected data not yet exfiltrated from the victim (e.g., [Local Data Staging](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1074/001)). Adversaries also often encrypt, encode, splice, or otherwise obfuscate this fileless data when stored. Some forms of fileless storage activity may indirectly create artifacts in the file system, but in central and otherwise difficult to inspect formats such as the WMI (e.g., `%SystemRoot%\System32\Wbem\R
Near-miss passage: T1027.018 Invisible Unicode. Tactics: stealth. Description: Adversaries may abuse invisible or non-printing Unicode characters to conceal malicious content within files, scripts, or text. By inserting characters that do not visibly render, adversaries may hide data, alter how content is interpreted, or make malicious code appear as benign text or whitespace. Adversaries may encode these malicious payloads, using binary, Base64, or custom schemes, to be reconstructed at runtime through scripting features such as [JavaScript](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059/007) Proxy traps, `eval()`, or other dynamic execution methods. This technique enables adversaries to evade visual inspection and basic static analysis by hiding malicious encoded content in innocuous text.(Citation: PUAs Unicode - Eriksen)(Citation: Tycoon2FA - Unicode)(Citation: Unicode - Veracode) Unicode is a standardized character encoding model that assigns a unique numerical value, known as a code point, to every character across writing systems, enabling consistent text representation across platforms, applications, and languages. Code points are represented as `U+` followed by a hexadecimal value and may be encoded using formats such as `UTF-8` or `UTF-16`. Adversaries may abuse the valid code points in Unicode that are not visibly rendered but still take up bytes, such as zero-width spaces, variation selectors, or bidirectional formatting controls, to conceal malicious payloads.(Citation: Tycoon2FA - Unicode)(Citation: GlassWorm - Unicode)(Citation: Unicode and Hidden Prompts - Perets) Adversaries may additionally exploit Private Use Area (PUA) characters, a range of code points reserved for custom assignment. PUA characters that are not defined by a font or application are typically rendered blank.(Citation: PUAs Unicode - Eriksen) Unicode characters may also be leveraged in support of other techniques such as [Phishing](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1660), [Right-to-Left Override](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1036/002), or [User Executio