Lateral Movement and Pivoting

The concepts of "lateral movement," "pivoting," and "privilege escalation" in cybersecurity explain how attackers use these techniques to navigate through a network, access different systems, and gain higher levels of access, often requires sophisticated detection methods like machine learning to identify suspicious activity amidst normal user behavior.

Key points:

Lateral movement:

This refers to an attacker moving from one compromised system to another within a network to reach their target data or system, often by exploiting shared credentials or vulnerabilities.

Pivoting:

Similar to lateral movement, pivoting involves using an initially compromised system as a launchpad to access other systems within the network, essentially "hopping" from one compromised machine to another to penetrate the network further.

Privilege escalation:

Once an attacker gains initial access to a system, they may attempt to elevate their user privileges to gain administrative control, allowing them to perform more sensitive actions.

PtH (Pass the Hash) attacks help facilitate these types of attacks.

Detection challenges:

Normal vs. anomalous behavior:

Differentiating between legitimate user actions and malicious activity can be complex, making detection reliant on advanced techniques like machine learning algorithms to identify unusual behavior patterns.

Anomalous logins and privilege use:

Monitoring for suspicious logins from unusual locations, excessive failed login attempts, or sudden elevation of user privileges can indicate potential lateral movement or privilege escalation attempts.