In-place AES encryption of sandbox files

ransomware_entropy_encrypt

Creates 120 low-entropy documents in the sandbox and encrypts every one of them in place with AES-256, so the on-disk entropy of each file jumps from ordinary text to statistically flat. That jump is what entropy-based anti-ransomware watches for, and a rename alone cannot reproduce it. Only files this test created are touched.

Severity high how bad it would be if it were real
Expected outcome Something should notice
Platforms 3 macOS, Linux, Windows
Isolation subprocess runs in its own process, so a kill is a measurement

What it needs before it will run

  • --i-understand

    Needs explicit consent: this test changes machine state or fetches real offensive tooling.

Gates are cumulative and none of them is implied by another: see the three gates for why they are separate decisions.

ATT&CK techniques it exercises

MITRE ATT&CK techniques this test maps to.
Technique Name Tactic Across public reports
T1486 Data Encrypted for Impact Impact coverage statistics

How often anything notices

Not enough data: fewer than 3 public reports have run this test, so no rate is published for it. Groups below that threshold are withheld everywhere on the site — with one or two contributors an average is one organisation's result with a percent sign after it.

Other ransomware behaviour tests

Other tests in the Ransomware behaviour category.
Test What it does Severity
Destroying recovery points ransomware_shadow_copy_delete Deletes the machine's volume shadow copies with vssadmin and disables the boot recovery environment, the steps ransomware takes so a restore is imposs… critical
Ransomware-style mass rename and rewrite ransomware_mass_rename Creates 240 documents in a sandbox directory, then renames them all to a .locked extension, overwrites a subset with high-entropy data and drops a ran… high
Real ransomware extensions and ransom notes ransomware_note_and_extensions Renames sandbox documents to the extensions real families use (.locky, .wcry, .ryuk and others) and drops a ransom note in every subdirectory, which i… high
Rate-controlled rename storm ransomware_rename_storm Renames 600 sandbox files in paced batches of 50, recording how many had been renamed when something first intervened. That number is the detection th… high
EDR canary/decoy directory probe ransomware_canary_probe Read-only search for the canary and decoy files anti-ransomware products place on disk to detect mass file modification. Finding them shows behavioura… low

Catalogue generated from client 0.1.0. A test's behaviour can change between releases; this page describes the version named here.