Techniques › T1137 › T1137.004
T1137.004 Outlook Home Page
persistence — Windows, Office Suite · attack.mitre.org · JSON
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MITRE detection strategy
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analytics
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Sigma rules tagged attack.t1137.004
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KEV CVEs mapped here
<p>Adversaries may abuse Microsoft Outlook's Home Page feature to obtain persistence on a compromised system. Outlook Home Page is a legacy feature used to customize the presentation of Outlook folders. This feature allows for an internal or external URL to be loaded and presented whenever a folder is opened. A malicious HTML page can be crafted that will execute code when loaded by Outlook Home Page.</p><p>Once malicious home pages have been added to the user’s mailbox, they will be loaded when Outlook is started. Malicious Home Pages will execute when the right Outlook folder is loaded/reloaded.</p>
KEV CVEs mapped to this technique · CTID Mappings Explorer
None. No KEV entry in the public mapping names this technique. Given that 74.7% of KEV has no mapping at all, this says more about the mapping than about the technique.
Detection strategy · ATT&CK Enterprise v19.2
- DET0177 Detect Persistence via Outlook Home Page Exploitation v1.0
AN0502 WindowsAdversary uses a tool like Ruler to configure a malicious Outlook folder Home Page that loads a remote or embedded HTML payload upon folder interaction. Execution chain begins with Outlook launching, a specific folder being accessed, and a suspicious child process being spawned or COM-based execution invoked.WinEventLog:Application
Outlook logs indicating failure to load or render HTML page in Home Page view→ DC0038 Application Log ContentWinEventLog:PowerShellExecution of PowerShell script to enumerate or remove malicious Home Page folder config→ DC0064 Command ExecutionTunable:TargetFolderHTMLPayloadLocationChildProcessNameTimeWindowFormViewBehaviorAN0503 Office SuiteMalicious HTML or script is rendered as a Home Page for a specific Outlook folder. Outlook accesses that folder, loads remote content, and executes embedded JavaScript or ActiveX/COM logic resulting in unauthorized actions or local execution.m365:unifiedFolder configuration updated with external or HTML-formatted Home Page via Set-MailboxFolder→ DC0038 Application Log Contentm365:messagetraceInbound email triggering Outlook to auto-access folder tied to malicious Home Page→ DC0064 Command ExecutionTunable:AuditPolicyScopeFolderAccessRateExternalURLAllowlist
Sigma rules · SigmaHQ da9bb07d64, tag attack.t1137.004
No Sigma rule carries this tag. MITRE publishes a detection strategy above, so the behaviour is specified; what is missing is public detection content.
Rules tagged at the parent level (attack.t1137) 9
These target the parent technique, not this sub-technique specifically. Listed for completeness, not counted as coverage.
Author: Max Altgelt (Nextron Systems), Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)
· 2022-06-02 (modified 2023-06-22) · logsource: product=windows category=file_event · 0e20c89d-2264-44ae-8238-aeeaba609ece
Detects creation of Microsoft Office files inside of one of the default startup folders in order to achieve persistence.
Author: Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)
· 2023-02-08 · logsource: product=windows category=file_event · 117d3d3a-755c-4a61-b23e-9171146d094c
Detects the creation of a macro file for Outlook.
Author: Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)
· 2021-04-05 (modified 2023-08-17) · logsource: product=windows category=registry_set · 396ae3eb-4174-4b9b-880e-dc0364d78a19
Detects the modification of Outlook setting "LoadMacroProviderOnBoot" which if enabled allows the automatic loading of any configured VBA project/module
Author: frack113
· 2022-01-22 (modified 2023-08-17) · logsource: product=windows category=registry_set · 45e112d0-7759-4c2a-aa36-9f8fb79d3393
Hides the file extension through modification of the registry
Author: frack113
· 2022-01-22 (modified 2023-08-17) · logsource: product=windows category=registry_set · 5df86130-4e95-4a54-90f7-26541b40aec2
Hides the file extension through modification of the registry
Author: @ScoubiMtl
· 2021-04-05 (modified 2023-02-08) · logsource: product=windows category=file_event · 8c31f563-f9a7-450c-bfa8-35f8f32f1f61
Detects the creation of a macro file for Outlook.
Author: frack113
· 2021-12-28 (modified 2026-01-09) · logsource: product=windows category=registry_set · c3cefdf4-6703-4e1c-bad8-bf422fc5015a
Detects changes to the registry values related to outlook security settings
Author: @ScoubiMtl
· 2021-04-05 (modified 2023-08-17) · logsource: product=windows category=registry_set · e3b50fa5-3c3f-444e-937b-0a99d33731cd
Detects the modification of Outlook security setting to allow unprompted execution of macros.
Author: Nasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)
· 2023-04-05 (modified 2023-08-17) · logsource: product=windows category=registry_set · fc06e655-d98c-412f-ac76-05c2698b1cb2
Detects changes to the registry values related to outlook that indicates that a reminder was triggered for a Note or Task item. This could be a sign of exploitation of CVE-2023-23397. Further investigation is required to determine the success of an exploitation.