Networkforensic

Sysmon
Setup and config files

13 December 2025 

Information:
I have for a long time been writing detection for the Sysmon made by Sysinternals by Microsoft. The config file is very well tested on live attacks and a lot of malware. Tested with Atomic-Red test tools as well. It have been tested in Blue-teams/ Red-Team pen-tests with high success. It is used in forensic cases to monitor behavior on hacked / malware infected systems.

There have been a focus on, only to log what is importent. If you log everything that Sysmon can log, you will get way to many logs from the endpoints send to your SIEM system. That can have impact on licenses on SIEM systems and so on.

If you use "undocumented" config files, you basically don´t known why something is logged in the first place. This config is documnted in it self, with rule names and references to MITRE, LOBAS, LOLBINS and so on. You will know why and what is logged and send to SIEM. From there you can build near Real-Time Alerting in Splunk, Elastic. You can combine this with validation on things like HASH values, IP's from other systems like Recorded Future, MISP and others.

Rule based detections
Sinse Sysmon support "rule based detections". Many of the rules have been written as souch. This help to keep the amount of logs send to SIEM down and collection of logs very accurate.

Detection types
All detections are made with rule names, and are related to MITRE, LOLAPPS, LOLBAS, LOLDRIVERS, and more.

AutoRuns
Sysinternals AutoRuns is a tool that is very good at keeping an eye on what is happening in the regestry on Windows Systems. An implementation of Sysinternal Autoruns detections, have been added as well to the Sysmon config file. So the Sysmon config will work as AutoRuns.

Recommendation:
Note: You will need to customize network detections in Event ID 3 to match your needs. I have added a lot of common detection to the sysmon config file for a start. You can have other demands.

Not Covered
"Event ID 24: ClipboardChange" are not covered. Because this can be a security risk in most environments. You don't what to have copyed password in clear txt in an accessible folder. But this can be very useful in other scenarios. Like malware testing.

Supported Sysmon version
The Sysmon config can be used on Sysmon from version 15.00. (Sysmon schema version: 4.90).

SIEM system
Logs send to SIEM systems like Security Onion (elastic) or Splunk works verry well. But I reccormed to use it with Winlogbeat from elastic and sending your logs to Security Onion. And i also reccormed that you use proper Windows logging set by Security policys in Windows as GPO's. I can recommend to follow the NSACyber guide.
Then you will have a very good logging system togheter win IDS destection.

Sysmon install / uninstall  / Auto update Config file
Sysmon Install / Uinstall / Config Update script is included. 

This makes it verry easy to Install / uninstall Sysmon and update the Sysmon Config file on clients and servers just by changing 1 file on a central location. I can reccormend the use of your own web-server. You can auto update all clients and servers with my lates config file by using Task Scheduler in Windows. Config files for Task Scheduler is included for you to import to Task Scheduler. You just have to change from where you want hosts to get the config file from in the PowerShell script.

Monitoring of Sysmon alerts.
It is easy to monitor Sysmon alerts and create Notables in Splunk ore Alerts Dashboards in Security Onion.

Sysmon with install / uninstall scripts and auto update scripts.
Filename: Sysmon_15.15_Config_131.zip
SHA1: bd47420f925d7ab4976e9a6ace20ecd5a9b35db9

Sysmon Cheatsheet
Filename: Sysmon-Cheatsheet.pdf
SHA1:e573f2c2b46a5abef726b73f3690005b04780e5e

Latest updates

13-12-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 131
- Indirect Command Execution

07-12-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 129
- File creation time changed
- Data from Network Shared Drive
- Registry Run Keys

06-12-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 128
- File creation time changed

05-12-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 127
- Boot or Logon Initialization Scripts

18-11-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 126
- Domain or Tenant Policy Modification

13-11-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 124
- Unsecured Credentials
- Ingress Tool Transfer

02-11-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 120
- Obfuscated Files or Information
- Data from Local System
- File Metadata
- Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol
- Encrypted Channel

25-10-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 116
- Network Sniffing
- Data Encrypted for Impact

24-10-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 115
- Command and Scripting Interpreter
- Data Obfuscation: Steganography 

23-10-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 114
- Windows Command Shells
- Service Execution
- OS Credential Dumping

10-10-2025
Changes:
- Sysmon Config 110
- Exfiltration Over Bluetooth