Credentials

Adversaries may gather credentials that can be used during targeting. Account credentials gathered by adversaries may be those directly associated with the target victim organization or attempt to take advantage of the tendency for users to use the same passwords across personal and business accounts.

Adversaries may gather credentials from potential victims in various ways, such as direct elicitation via [Phishing for Information](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1598). Adversaries may also compromise sites then add malicious content designed to collect website authentication cookies from visitors.(Citation: ATT ScanBox) Credential information may also be exposed to adversaries via leaks to online or other accessible data sets (ex: [Search Engines](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1593/002), breach dumps, code repositories, etc.).(Citation: Register Deloitte)(Citation: Register Uber)(Citation: Detectify Slack Tokens)(Citation: Forbes GitHub Creds)(Citation: GitHub truffleHog)(Citation: GitHub Gitrob)(Citation: CNET Leaks) Adversaries may also purchase credentials from dark web or other black-markets. Finally, where multi-factor authentication (MFA) based on out-of-band communications is in use, adversaries may compromise a service provider to gain access to MFA codes and one-time passwords (OTP).(Citation: Okta Scatter Swine 2022)

Gathering this information may reveal opportunities for other forms of reconnaissance (ex: [Search Open Websites/Domains](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1593) or [Phishing for Information](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1598)), establishing operational resources (ex: [Compromise Accounts](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1586)), and/or initial access (ex: [External Remote Services](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1133) or [Valid Accounts](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078)). 

Platforms: PRE
Tactics:
phase_name: reconnaissance

Detection:
Much of this activity may have a very high occurrence and associated false positive rate, as well as potentially taking place outside the visibility of the target organization, making detection difficult for defenders.

Detection efforts may be focused on related stages of the adversary lifecycle, such as during Initial Access.

References:
source_name: mitre-attack
description: Blasco, J. (2014, August 28). Scanbox: A Reconnaissance Framework Used with Watering Hole Attacks. Retrieved October 19, 2020.
source_name: ATT ScanBox
description: Detectify. (2016, April 28). Slack bot token leakage exposing business critical information. Retrieved October 19, 2020.
source_name: Detectify Slack Tokens
description: Dylan Ayrey. (2016, December 31). truffleHog. Retrieved October 19, 2020.
source_name: GitHub truffleHog
description: McCarthy, K. (2015, February 28). FORK ME! Uber hauls GitHub into court to find who hacked database of 50,000 drivers. Retrieved October 19, 2020.
source_name: Register Uber
description: Michael Henriksen. (2018, June 9). Gitrob: Putting the Open Source in OSINT. Retrieved October 19, 2020.
source_name: GitHub Gitrob
description: Ng, A. (2019, January 17). Massive breach leaks 773 million email addresses, 21 million passwords. Retrieved October 20, 2020.
source_name: CNET Leaks
description: Okta. (2022, August 25). Detecting Scatter Swine: Insights into a Relentless Phishing Campaign. Retrieved February 24, 2023.
source_name: Okta Scatter Swine 2022
description: Sandvik, R. (2014, January 14). Attackers Scrape GitHub For Cloud Service Credentials, Hijack Account To Mine Virtual Currency. Retrieved October 19, 2020.
source_name: Forbes GitHub Creds
description: Thomson, I. (2017, September 26). Deloitte is a sitting duck: Key systems with RDP open, VPN and proxy 'login details leaked'. Retrieved October 19, 2020.
source_name: Register Deloitte