Understanding and using Windows Audit ACLs
On Windows, a good way to implement canary tokens and decoy files is via Audit ACLs. In Windows, every object can have a security descriptor, and there is even a language called the security descriptor definition language (SDDL) that articulates them.
The security descriptor basically contains a discretionary access control list (DACL) and an optional SACL. The former contains various Access Control Entries (ACEs) that contain information such as which account/group owns the resource and which account can read, write, and modify a particular resource.
The SACL (which is the lesser known aspect of the security descriptor) can be used for auditing purposes. This is an ACL that allows us to monitor an object for access. Using SACLs is perfect for sentinel objects and honeytokens. This is what we are going to do next.
Configuring a file to be audited by Windows using SACLs
As we mentioned previously, SACLs are used for auditing. Let...
