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MITRE ATT&CK® ICS Asset

A0006: Data Historian

Data historians, or historian, are systems used to collect and store data, including telemetry, events, alerts, and alarms about the operational process and supporting devices. The historian typically utilizes a database to store this data, and commonly provide tools and interfaces to support the analysis of the data. Data historians are often used to support various engineering or business analysis functions and therefore commonly needs access from the corporate network. Data historians often work in a hierarchical paradigm where lower/site level historians collect and store data which is then aggregated into a site/plant level historian. Therefore, data historians often have remote services that can be accessed externally from the ICS network. Many data historian vendors have designed their software to securely transfer data between the ICS and business networks instead of requiring business systems to access the data historian in the ICS network directly.

ICSA0006ICS AssetObject v2.1 Modified
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Glexia's Take

Analyst context for executives and security teams

Analyst confidence High

A data historian is often the bridge between operational process data and business or engineering analysis. That makes it important beyond “just another OT server”: it may hold telemetry, events, alerts, alarms, and process history, and it commonly needs some form of corporate-network access or data transfer path. If poorly governed, it can become a place to observe process state, collect sensitive operational information, or disrupt the availability and integrity of data that operators and business teams rely on.

Executive priority

Treat historians as high-value ICS assets because they connect operational visibility with business use cases. Leaders should ask whether historian access paths between ICS and corporate networks are explicitly designed, documented, monitored, and justified; whether remote services are limited to approved use; and whether the organization can prove who accessed historian data, from where, and for what purpose. This matters for operational resilience, audit evidence, incident scoping, and cyber-physical risk decisions when process telemetry or alarms are part of safety, reliability, or production workflows.

Technical view

For SOC, detection engineering, and IR teams, validate visibility around Windows, Linux, and embedded historian deployments and the network paths that aggregate lower/site-level historians into plant or site historians. Relationship context shows this asset can be targeted by process-state monitoring, automated collection, information repository collection, remote services, CLI/GUI access, discovery, port/broadcast/multicast scanning, network sniffing, adversary-in-the-middle activity, valid accounts, scripting, masquerading, rootkits, data destruction, denial of service, and restart/shutdown behavior. Because MITRE provides no official detection guidance for this asset, local baselines are essential: normal historian queries, approved engineering/business analytics jobs, expected data-transfer services, and sanctioned remote access should be clearly distinguishable from unusual enumeration, bulk access, administrative sessions, or destructive changes.

Likely telemetry

  • Historian application logs, database access logs, query history, export activity, and alarm/event access records
  • Authentication and authorization logs for users, service accounts, remote services, and corporate-to-ICS access paths
  • Windows and Linux endpoint telemetry: process execution, command-line use, scripting activity, service changes, file creation/deletion, and system restart/shutdown events
  • Network flow and packet metadata between lower/site historians, plant/site historians, ICS segments, and corporate network consumers
  • Remote access, GUI, VPN/Citrix or other external remote service session logs where applicable

Detection direction

  • Start with an approved communications map: which systems may query, administer, replicate, or receive data from each historian tier.
  • Baseline normal business analytics, engineering analysis, vendor transfer tools, and scheduled aggregation jobs to reduce false positives from legitimate high-volume historian access.
  • Tune for unusual access patterns: new source hosts, new accounts, off-hours sessions, unexpected remote services, abnormal query/export volume, or access to process-state data outside known workflows.
  • Correlate endpoint and network signals: CLI/GUI sessions, scripting, native API activity, file changes, and remote sessions should be reviewed alongside historian queries and network discovery.
  • Watch for discovery around historian assets, including port scans, broadcast discovery, multicast discovery, network connection enumeration, and sniffing-related indicators where sensors support it.

Mitigation priorities

  • Inventory historians, their operating platforms, tiers, databases, interfaces, remote services, and approved corporate-network dependencies.
  • Prefer controlled historian data-transfer architectures over broad direct corporate access to historians inside the ICS network, consistent with the asset description.
  • Restrict remote services and administrative interfaces to approved users, systems, and network paths; review valid accounts and service accounts for least privilege.
  • Maintain segmentation and access control between corporate networks, site/plant historians, and lower/site-level historians while preserving required operational data flows.
  • Harden Windows, Linux, and embedded historian hosts by reducing unnecessary services, controlling CLI/GUI administration paths, and monitoring scripting and file changes.
Analyst notes and limits

The most important decision point is whether the historian is treated as a monitored boundary asset between operations and business users, not merely as an engineering database. The relationships show a broad set of possible adversary interactions, but they do not prove that every historian exposes every interface or risk. Local architecture, vendor implementation, account model, and data-transfer design determine which controls and detections matter most.

MITRE provides an asset description, platforms, and relationships, but no official detection guidance, tactics, aliases, or vendor-specific implementation details. This take does not assert active exploitation, attribution, or guaranteed detection coverage. Validation requires environment-specific evidence from historian architecture, logs, network flows, identity systems, and remote access controls.

Official MITRE ATT&CK definition

Data Historian

Data historians, or historian, are systems used to collect and store data, including telemetry, events, alerts, and alarms about the operational process and supporting devices. The historian typically utilizes a database to store this data, and commonly provide tools and interfaces to support the analysis of the data. Data historians are often used to support various engineering or business analysis functions and therefore commonly needs access from the corporate network. Data historians often work in a hierarchical paradigm where lower/site level historians collect and store data which is then aggregated into a site/plant level historian. Therefore, data historians often have remote services that can be accessed externally from the ICS network. Many data historian vendors have designed their software to securely transfer data between the ICS and business networks instead of requiring business systems to access the data historian in the ICS network directly.

View the same entry on attack.mitre.org (MITRE-hosted reference; in-page links above use the Glexia ATT&CK library.)

Glexia analysis

How security teams should use this page

Treat this object as behavior context, not an attribution claim. Validate the related groups, software, data sources, and mitigations against official ATT&CK relationships and your own telemetry before making control-coverage decisions.

ATT&CK relationship table

Techniques used

This mirrors the MITRE pattern of making group, software, campaign, and technique relationships scannable. Relationship notes come from mirrored ATT&CK relationship text when available.

46 rows
Domain ID Name Relationship / procedure
ICS T0862 Supply Chain Compromise Supply Chain Compromise targets this object.
ICS T0872 Indicator Removal on Host Indicator Removal on Host targets this object.
ICS T0811 Data from Information Repositories Data from Information Repositories targets this object.
ICS T0823 Graphical User Interface Graphical User Interface targets this object.
ICS T0885 Commonly Used Port Commonly Used Port targets this object.
ICS T0846 Remote System Discovery Remote System Discovery targets this object.
ICS T0892 Change Credential Change Credential targets this object.
ICS T0830 Adversary-in-the-Middle Adversary-in-the-Middle targets this object.
ICS T0842 Network Sniffing Network Sniffing targets this object.
ICS T0874 Hooking Hooking targets this object.
ICS T0814 Denial of Service Denial of Service targets this object.
ICS T0853 Scripting Scripting targets this object.
ICS T0816 Device Restart/Shutdown Device Restart/Shutdown targets this object.
ICS T0881 Service Stop Service Stop targets this object.
ICS T0801 Monitor Process State Monitor Process State targets this object.
ICS T0893 Data from Local System Data from Local System targets this object.
ICS T0820 Exploitation for Evasion Exploitation for Evasion targets this object.
ICS T0847 Replication Through Removable Media Replication Through Removable Media targets this object.
ICS T0846.002 Broadcast Discovery Sub-technique Broadcast Discovery targets this object.
ICS T0846.003 Multicast Discovery Sub-technique Multicast Discovery targets this object.
ICS T0866 Exploitation of Remote Services Exploitation of Remote Services targets this object.
ICS T0849 Masquerading Masquerading targets this object.
ICS T0895 Autorun Image Autorun Image targets this object.
ICS T1694.001 Default Credentials Sub-technique Default Credentials targets this object.
ICS T1695.002 Ethernet Sub-technique Ethernet targets this object.
ICS T0878 Alarm Suppression Alarm Suppression targets this object.
ICS T0840 Network Connection Enumeration Network Connection Enumeration targets this object.
ICS T0869 Standard Application Layer Protocol Standard Application Layer Protocol targets this object.
ICS T0884 Connection Proxy Connection Proxy targets this object.
ICS T0848 Rogue Master Rogue Master targets this object.
ICS T1695 Block Communications Block Communications targets this object.
ICS T0859 Valid Accounts Valid Accounts targets this object.
ICS T0807 Command-Line Interface Command-Line Interface targets this object.
ICS T0851 Rootkit Rootkit targets this object.
ICS T0894 System Binary Proxy Execution System Binary Proxy Execution targets this object.
ICS T0886 Remote Services Remote Services targets this object.
ICS T1695.003 Wi-Fi Sub-technique Wi-Fi targets this object.
ICS T1694 Insecure Credentials Insecure Credentials targets this object.
ICS T0846.001 Port Scan Sub-technique Port Scan targets this object.
ICS T0834 Native API Native API targets this object.
ICS T0822 External Remote Services External Remote Services targets this object.
ICS T0890 Exploitation for Privilege Escalation Exploitation for Privilege Escalation targets this object.
ICS T0861 Point & Tag Identification Point & Tag Identification targets this object.
ICS T0809 Data Destruction Data Destruction targets this object.
ICS T0888 Remote System Information Discovery Remote System Information Discovery targets this object.
ICS T0802 Automated Collection Automated Collection targets this object.
Relationship explorer

All related ATT&CK context

targets · Technique T0862: Supply Chain Compromise ICS targets · Technique T0872: Indicator Removal on Host ICS targets · Technique T0811: Data from Information Repositories ICS targets · Technique T0823: Graphical User Interface ICS targets · Technique T0885: Commonly Used Port ICS targets · Technique T0846: Remote System Discovery ICS targets · Technique T0892: Change Credential ICS targets · Technique T0830: Adversary-in-the-Middle ICS targets · Technique T0842: Network Sniffing ICS targets · Technique T0874: Hooking ICS targets · Technique T0814: Denial of Service ICS targets · Technique T0853: Scripting ICS targets · Technique T0816: Device Restart/Shutdown ICS targets · Technique T0881: Service Stop ICS targets · Technique T0801: Monitor Process State ICS targets · Technique T0893: Data from Local System ICS targets · Technique T0820: Exploitation for Evasion ICS targets · Technique T0847: Replication Through Removable Media ICS targets · Technique T0846.002: Broadcast Discovery ICS targets · Technique T0846.003: Multicast Discovery ICS targets · Technique T0866: Exploitation of Remote Services ICS targets · Technique T0849: Masquerading ICS targets · Technique T0895: Autorun Image ICS targets · Technique T1694.001: Default Credentials ICS
Change history

Object version and sync metadata

The fields below describe the current mirrored snapshot. When Glexia retains multiple ATT&CK source imports, you can open the table to compare the same object across releases (hashes and MITRE timestamps). For MITRE’s own release notes and roadmap, see ATT&CK resources — Updates .

ATT&CK release
19.1
Object version
2.1
Created
Modified
Raw hash
b84fa8dd662ed5e1...
Imported snapshots across ATT&CK releases (1)
Release Bundle imported Object version Modified Status Raw hash
19.1 2.1 Current bundle b84fa8dd662e…
Raw source

Mirrored ATT&CK source object

The raw object is retained through the mirrored ATT&CK source bundle and object hash. The raw endpoint returns the exact object from the mirrored bundle when available.

Open mirrored raw JSON Open MITRE-hosted copy
Source references

External references and citations

MITRE external references are preserved separately from Glexia analysis so citations remain traceable to their original source records.

  1. [1]
    mitre-attack A0006
    Open source URL
Source and licensing

Source: MITRE ATT&CK®. © 2026 The MITRE Corporation. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of The MITRE Corporation. MITRE ATT&CK and ATT&CK are registered trademarks of The MITRE Corporation. Glexia is not affiliated with or endorsed by MITRE.

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