Snort Rules
Snort Rules
Snort Rules
Snort uses a simple, lightweight rules description language that is flexible and quite powerful. The first is that Snort rules must be completely contained on a single line, the Snort rule parser doesn't know how to handle rules on multiple lines.
Snort rules
The words before the colons in the rule options section are called option keywords. the rule options section is not specifically required by any rule, they are just used for the sake of making tighter definitions of packets to collect or alert on (or drop, for that matter). All of the elements in that make up a rule must be true for the indicated rule action to be taken.
Snort rules
When taken together, the elements can be considered to form a logical AND statement. At the same time, the various rules in a Snort rules library file can be considered to form a large logical OR statement.
Rule Headers
Rule Actions:
The rule header contains the information that defines the "who, where, and what" of a packet, as well as what to do in the event that a packet with all the attributes indicated in the rule should show up. The first item in a rule is the rule action. The rule action tells Snort what to do when it finds a packet that matches the rule criteria. There are three available actions in Snort, alert, log, and pass alert - generate an alert using the selected alert method, and then log the packet log - log the packet pass - drop (ignore) the packet
Rule headers
Protocols:The next field in a rule is the protocol. There are three IP protocols that Snort currently analyzes for suspicious behavior, tcp, udp, and icmp. Tcp Udp icmp
Rule Headers
IP Addresses:The next portion of the rule header deals with the IP address and port information for a given rule. The keyword "any" may be used to define any address. Snort does not have a mechanism to provide host name lookup for the IP address fields in the rules file. The addresses are formed by a straight numeric IP address and a CIDR block. The CIDR block indicates the netmask that should be applied to the rule's address and any incoming packets that are tested against the rule. A CIDR block mask of /24 indicates a Class C network, /16 a Class B network, and /32 indicates a specific machine address. For example, the address/CIDR combination 192.168.1.0/24 would signify the block of addresses from 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.1.255. Any rule that used this designation for, say, the destination address would match on any address in that range. The CIDR designations give us a nice short-hand way to designate large address spaces with just a few characters.
Address in a rule
alert tcp any any -> 192.168.1.0/24 111 (content:"|00 01 86 a5|"; msg: "mountd access";).
The source IP address was set to match for any computer talking, and the destination address was set to match on the 192.168.1.0 Class C network.
Snort rules
There is an operator that can be applied to IP addresses, the negation operator. This operator tells Snort to match any IP address except the one indicated by the listed IP address. The negation operator is indicated with a "!". For example, an easy modification to the initial example is to make it alert on any traffic that originates outside of the local net with the negation operator.
alert tcp !192.168.1.0/24 any -> 192.168.1.0/24 111 (content: "|00 01 86 a5|"; msg: "external mountd access";)
This rule's IP addresses indicate "any tcp packet with a source IP address not originating from the internal network and a destination address on the internal network".
Port numbers
Port Numbers Port numbers may be specified in a number of ways, including "any" ports, static port definitions, ranges, and by negation. "Any" ports are a wildcard value, meaning literally any port. Static ports are indicated by a single port number, such as 111 for portmapper, 23 for telnet, or 80 for http, etc. Port ranges are indicated with the range operator ":". The range operator may be applied in a number of ways to take on different meanings,
Example
log udp any any -> 192.168.1.0/24 1:1024 log udp traffic coming from any port and destination ports ranging from 1 to 1024 log tcp any any -> 192.168.1.0/24 :6000 log tcp traffic from any port going to ports less than or equal to 6000 log tcp any :1024 -> 192.168.1.0/24 500: log tcp traffic from priveleged ports less than or equal to 1024 going to ports greater than or equal to 500
Negation in port
Port negation is indicated by using the negation operator "!". The negation operator may be applied against any of the other rule types (except any, which would translate to none). log tcp any any -> 192.168.1.0/24 !6000:6010
Rule Options
Rule options form the heart of Snort's intrusion detection engine, combining ease of use with power and flexibility. All Snort rule options are separated from each other using the semicolon ";" character. Rule option keywords are separated from their arguments with a colon ":" character. There are fifteen rule option keywords available for Snort:
Rule option
msg - prints a message in alerts and packet logs logto - log the packet to a user specified filename instead of the standard output file minfrag - set a threshold value for the smallest acceptable IP fragment size ttl - test the IP header's TTL field value id - test the IP header's fragment ID field for a specific value dsize - test the packet's payload size against a value content - search for a pattern in the packet's payloadoffset - modifier for the content option, sets the offset to begin attempting a pattern match depth - modifier for the content option, sets the maximum search depth for a pattern match attempt flags - test the TCP flags for certain values seq - test the TCP sequence number field for a specific value ack - test the TCP acknowledgement field for a specific value itype - test the ICMP type field against a specific value icode - test the ICMP code field against a specific value session - dumps the application layer information for a given session
Msg
The msg rule option tells the logging and alerting engine the message to print along with a packet dump or to an alert. It is a simple text string that utilizes the "\" as an escape character to indicate a discrete character that might otherwise confuse Snort's rules parser (such as the semi-colon ";" character). Format: msg: "<message text>";
Logto
The logto option tells Snort to log all packets that trigger this rule to a special output log file. Format:logto: "<filename>";
Minfrag
Minfrag sets a minimum size threshold for a fragmented packet. It is generally used in conjunction with a single alert rule to set a boundry for the minimum fragment size that is acceptable on a network segment. It makes a handy detector for attackers that like to break their fragments into tiny pieces before transmitting them to try to avoid detection mechaisms. Generally speaking, there is virtually no commercial network equipment available that generates fragments smaller than 256-bytes, so people can take advantage of this fact by setting their minfrag value somewhere below that threshold.
Minfrag example
Format:minfrag: "<number>"; alert tcp any any -> any any (minfrag: 256; msg: "Tiny fragments detected, possible hostile activity";)
TTL
This rule option is used to set a specific time-to-live value to test against. The test it performs is only sucessful on an exact match. This option keyword was intended for use in the detection of traceroute attempts. Format: ttl: "<number>";
ID
This option keyword is used to test for an exact match in the IP header fragment ID field. Some hacking tools (and other programs) set this field specifically for various purposes, for example the value 31337 is very popular with some hackers. This can be turned against them by putting a simple rule in place to test for this and some other "hacker numbers". Format: id: "<number> ;
Dsize
The dsize option is used to test the packet payload size. It may be set to any value, plus use the greater than/less than signs to indicate ranges and limits. For example, if you know that a certain service has a buffer of a certain size, you can set this option to watch for attempted buffer overflows. It has the added advantage of being a much faster way to test for a buffer overflow than a payload content check.
Format: dsize: [>|<] <number>; Note: The > and < operators are optional!
Content
The content keyword is one of the more important features of Snort. It allows the user to set rules that search for specific content in the packet payload and trigger response based on that data. Whenever a content option pattern match is performed, the Boyer-Moore pattern match function is called and the (rather computationally expensive) test is performed against the packet contents. If data exactly matching the argument data string is contained anywhere within the packet's payload, the test is successful and the remainder of the rule option tests are performed. Be aware that this test is case sensitive.The option data for the content keyword is somewhat complex; it can contain mixed text and binary data. The binary data is generally enclosed within the pipe ("|") character and represented as bytecode. Bytecode represents binary data as hexidecimal numbers and is a good shorthand method for describing complex binary data. .
Example of content
An example of mixed text and binary data in a Snort rule.
alert tcp any any -> 192.168.1.0/24 143 (content: "|90C8 C0FF FFFF|/bin/sh"; msg: "IMAP buffer overflow!";) Format: content: "<content string>";
offset
The offset rule option is used as a modifier to rules using the content option keyword. This keyword modifies the starting search position for the pattern match function from the beginning of the packet payload. It is very useful for things like CGI scan detection rules where the content search string is never found in the first four bytes of the payload. Care should be taken against setting the offset value too "tightly" and potentially missing an attack! This rule option keyword cannot be used without also specifying a content rule option. Format: offset: <number>;
depth
Depth is another content rule option modifier. This sets the maximum search depth for the content pattern match function to search from the beginning of its search region. It is useful for limiting the pattern match function from performing inefficient searches once the possible search region for a given set of content has been exceeded. (Which is to say, if you're searching for "cgi-bin/phf" in a web-bound packet, you probably don't need to waste time searching the payload beyond the first 20 bytes!) search rule. Format: depth: <number>;
Example
An example of a combined content, offset, and depth alert tcp any any -> 192.168.1.0/24 80 (content: "cgi-bin/phf"; offset: 3; depth: 22; msg: "CGI-PHF attack";)
Flags
This rule tests the TCP flags for an exact match. There are actually 8 flags variables available in Snort: F - FIN (LSB in TCP Flags byte) S - SYN R - RST P - PSH A - ACK U - URG 2 - Reserved bit 2 1 - Reserved bit 1 (MSB in TCP Flags byte) The reserved bits can be used to detect unusual behavior, such as IP stack fingerprinting attempts or other suspicious activity. All of the flags are considered as a whole for this test, they must all be "up" for this rule option to be successful.
Example
alert any any -> 192.168.1.0/24 any (flags: SF; msg: "Possible SYN FIN scan";)
seq
This rule option refers to the TCP sequence number. Essentially, it detects if the packet has a static sequence number set, and is therefore pretty much unused. It was included for the sake of completeness. Format: seq: <number>;
ack
The ack rule option keyword refers to the TCP header's acknowledge field. This rule has one practical purpose so far: detecting NMAP TCP pings. A NMAP TCP ping sets this field to zero and sends a packet with the TCP ACK flag set to determine if a network host is active. Format: ack: <number>;
Example
alert any any -> 192.168.1.0/24 any (flags: A; ack: 0; msg: "NMAP TCP ping";)
itype
This rule tests the value of the ICMP type field. It is set using the numeric value of this field. For a list of the available values, look in the decode.h file included with Snort or in any ICMP reference. It should be noted that the values can be set out of range to detect invalid ICMP type values that are sometimes used in denial of service and flooding attacks. Format: itype: <number>;
icode
The icode rule option keyword is pretty much identical to the itype rule, just set a numeric value in here and Snort will detect any traffic using that ICMP code value. Out of range values can also be set to detect suspicious traffic. Format: icode: <number>;
session
The session keyword is brand new as of version 1.3.1.1 and is used to extract the user data from TCP sessions. It is extremely useful for seeing what users are typing in telnet, rlogin, ftp, or even web sessions. There are two available argument keywords for the session rule option, printable or all. The printable keyword only prints out data that the user would normally see or be able to type. The all keyword substitutes non-printable characters with their hexadecimal equivalents. This function can slow Snort down considerably, so it shouldn't be used in heavy load situations, and is probably best suited for post-processing binary (tcpdump format) log files.
var
As of version 1.3.1.2, variables may be defined in Snort. Format: var: <name> <value>
Example
var MY_NET 192.168.1.0/24 alert tcp any any -> $MY_NET any
The rule variable names can be modified in several ways. You can define meta-variables using the "$" operator. These can be used with the variable modifier operators, "?" and "-". $var - define meta variable $(var) - replace with the contents of variable "var $(var:-default) - replace with the contents of the variable "var" or with "default" if "var" is undefined. $(var:?message) - replace with the contents of variable "var" or print out the error message "message" and exit
Example
var MY_NET $(MY_NET:192.168.1.0/24) log tcp any any -> $(MY_NET:?MY_NET is undefined!) 23
session
log tcp any any <> 192.168.1.0/24 23 (session: printable;)
Example
An example shows a SYN-FIN scan detection rule.