The Background Activity Monitor and Desktop Activity Montior registry artifacts provide evidence of execution on an endpoint. It is only available in Windows 10 and Windows 11.
- Behavioral - Execution (TA0002)
- Account - Security Identifier (SID)
- Execution - Last Executed
- Execution - Permissions / Account
- Execution - Evidence of Execution
- File - Path
- Windows 11
- Windows 10 (
⚠️ 1709 and later)
🔋 Live System:
Newer Windows 10 Versions
- BAM:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\bam\state\UserSettings\{USER_SID}
- DAM:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\dam\state\UserSettings\{USER_SID}
Older Windows 10 Versions
- BAM:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\bam\UserSettings\{USER_SID}
- DAM:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\dam\UserSettings\{USER_SID}
🔌 Offline system:
Newer Windows 10 Versions
- File:
%SystemRoot%\System32\config\SYSTEM
- BAM:
SYSTEM\{CURRENT_CONTROL_SET}\Services\bam\state\UserSettings\{USER_SID}
- DAM:
SYSTEM\{CURRENT_CONTROL_SET}\Services\dam\state\UserSettings\{USER_SID}
Older Windows 10 Versions
- File:
%SystemRoot%\System32\config\SYSTEM
- BAM:
SYSTEM\{CURRENT_CONTROL_SET}\Services\bam\UserSettings\{USER_SID}
- DAM:
SYSTEM\{CURRENT_CONTROL_SET}\Services\dam\UserSettings\{USER_SID}
Note
More information on {CURRENT_CONTROL_SET}
- RegistryExplorer (Eric Zimmerman)
The Execution Time
as seen in RegistryExplorer represents the most recent time of execution for the binary in UTC. The Program
field represents the full path the the binary.
Note
Based on testing, this execution time is written upon process creation, and again on termination.
In the event that you are parsing or interpreting this artifact manually, the following CyberChef recipe can be used to convert Windows FILETIME timestamps to a date and time:
[
{ "op": "From Hex",
"args": ["Auto"] },
{ "op": "To Hex",
"args": ["None", 0] },
{ "op": "Windows Filetime to UNIX Timestamp",
"args": ["Milliseconds (ms)", "Hex (little endian)"] },
{ "op": "From UNIX Timestamp",
"args": ["Milliseconds (ms)"] }
]
- Path:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\bam\State\UserSettings\S-1-5-21-3471133136-2963561160-3931775028-1001
- Key:
\Device\HarddiskVolume4\Program Files\PuTTY\putty.exe
- Type:
REG_BINARY
- Value:
60-9F-62-A8-FB-6C-D9-01-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-02-00-00-00
The 64-Bit FILETIME timestamp 60-9F-62-A8-FB-6C-D9-01
resolves to Wed 12 April 2023 05:00:10 UTC
, which is the last known execution of the binary putty.exe
.
This example was produced on Windows 10, Version 10.0.19044 Build 19044
Console applications that are launched through a command line interface will not have BAM/DAM entries.
Search for BAM entries for executables that reside in suspicious locations, such as:
- User
Downloads
directories - Other user profile directories such as
Desktop
orDocuments
C:\Temp
C:\PerfLogs