Adversaries may abuse time providers to execute DLLs when the system boots. The Windows Time service (W32Time) enables time synchronization across and within domains.^[1] W32Time time providers are responsible for retrieving time stamps from hardware/network resources and outputting these values to other network clients.^[2]

Time providers are implemented as dynamic-link libraries (DLLs) that are registered in the subkeys of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\W32Time\TimeProviders\.^[2] The time provider manager, directed by the service control manager, loads and starts time providers listed and enabled under this key at system startup and/or whenever parameters are changed.^[2]

Adversaries may abuse this architecture to establish persistence, specifically by creating a new arbitrarily named subkey pointing to a malicious DLL in the DllName value. Administrator privileges are required for time provider registration, though execution will run in context of the Local Service account.^[3]

References

1. Microsoft. (2018, February 1). Windows Time Service (W32Time). Retrieved March 26, 2018.
2. Microsoft. (n.d.). Time Provider. Retrieved March 26, 2018.
3. Lundgren, S. (2017, October 28). w32time. Retrieved March 26, 2018.

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