A0015: Switch

In an ICS environment, a switch is not just “network plumbing.” It connects HMIs, PLCs, workstations, servers, and other endpoints inside Purdue Model levels, so compromise, misconfiguration, or disruption can affect visibility, control traffic, segmentation, and operational continuity. Because ATT&CK relationships show many adversary behaviors targeting switches, leaders should treat switch management, monitoring, and recovery as part of OT resilience—not only network administration.

Executive priority

Prioritize switches as critical shared infrastructure for ICS availability and segmentation. Executive questions should include: Which switches define or connect key Purdue Model segments? Who can administer them locally or remotely? Are default or shared credentials eliminated? Can the team prove configuration integrity and recover quickly after destructive change, restart, shutdown, or denial-of-service conditions? This matters for incident decision-making, audit evidence, vulnerability prioritization, and cyber-physical risk where network disruption could affect process visibility or control.

Technical view

SOC, detection engineering, and IR teams should validate monitoring around both the data plane and management plane of embedded/network switches. The relationship context indicates relevant behaviors include CLI and GUI access, valid accounts, external remote services, remote service exploitation, discovery through port scans/broadcast/multicast, network sniffing, adversary-in-the-middle activity, standard application layer protocol use, scripting/API/native API activity, indicator removal, rootkit/hooking-style concealment, data destruction, restart/shutdown, denial of service, and supply chain compromise. Since ATT&CK provides no official detection text for this asset, coverage should be proven locally through logs, network evidence, configuration baselines, and incident response exercises.

Likely telemetry

Switch management access logs for CLI, GUI, and remote administration where available
Authentication and account-use records for administrative and service accounts
Configuration change history, startup/running configuration backups, and integrity comparisons
Network flow records and packet captures around switch-connected segments
Evidence of port scanning, broadcast discovery, and multicast discovery on ICS subnets

Detection direction

Start by mapping which switches connect critical ICS assets and Purdue Model levels, then validate that monitoring covers those segments and management interfaces.
Tune for unusual administrative access patterns: unexpected CLI/GUI sessions, remote service use, new source locations, abnormal timing, or account use inconsistent with maintenance windows.
Baseline normal ICS discovery and management traffic before alerting on scans, broadcast discovery, multicast discovery, or standard application layer protocols to reduce false positives from legitimate engineering tools.
Correlate network symptoms with device evidence: DoS, restart/shutdown, AiTM, and sniffing-related activity may appear first as traffic anomalies, loss of connectivity, or unexpected forwarding behavior.
Validate configuration integrity detection, because destructive changes or indicator removal may reduce the usefulness of on-device logs after compromise.

Mitigation priorities

Maintain an authoritative inventory of ICS switches, their Purdue Model role, connected critical assets, management interfaces, firmware/software state, and approved administrators.
Restrict switch administration paths, especially external remote services, and separate routine user traffic from management access where the environment supports it.
Strengthen identity controls for switch administration: remove default credentials, limit privileged accounts, and review valid-account use tied to maintenance activity.
Keep recoverable configuration backups and tested restoration procedures for destructive change, restart/shutdown events, and availability incidents.
Prioritize vulnerability management for exposed remote services and embedded/network switch software based on operational criticality and reachable attack surface.

Additional notes and limits

This take is based on the ATT&CK ICS asset A0015 Switch and its supplied relationships. The object describes switches as Layer 2 or Layer 3 network devices connecting endpoints such as workstations, servers, HMIs, and PLCs, commonly used to define network segments and connect devices within Purdue Model levels. Relationship-driven context shows a broad set of techniques targeting this asset, so defensive value comes from validating management-plane security, network visibility, configuration integrity, and recovery readiness.

MITRE provides no official detection guidance for this asset, and tactics are not specified in the supplied object. The related technique descriptions support risk themes but do not prove any specific environment is exposed or that any control is effective. Local architecture, switch capabilities, logging configuration, remote access design, and operational constraints are required to determine actual coverage and priority.

Generated from the cited source records. This long-tail analysis has not been individually reviewed by a named human.

Official MITRE ATT&CK definition

Switch

A switch is a network device that connects endpoints (e.g., workstations, servers, HMIs, PLCs, etc.) so that they can communicate and share data and resources. Switches may operate at either Layer 2 or Layer 3 of the OSI Model and intelligently forward packets across the network based on the specified address (Media Access Control (MAC) address for Layer 2 and Internet Protocol (IP) address for Layer 3). Switches are typically used to define network segments and connect the devices within a particular level of the Purdue Model.

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.

Filter related techniques39 rows

Domain	ID	Name	Relationship / procedure
ICS	T0859	Valid Accounts	Valid Accounts targets this object.
ICS	T1695.003	Wi-FiSub-technique	Wi-Fi targets this object.
ICS	T0823	Graphical User Interface	Graphical User Interface targets this object.
ICS	T0834	Native API	Native API targets this object.
ICS	T0874	Hooking	Hooking targets this object.
ICS	T0840	Network Connection Enumeration	Network Connection Enumeration targets this object.
ICS	T0866	Exploitation of Remote Services	Exploitation of Remote Services targets this object.
ICS	T0886	Remote Services	Remote Services targets this object.
ICS	T0881	Service Stop	Service Stop targets this object.
ICS	T0830	Adversary-in-the-Middle	Adversary-in-the-Middle targets this object.
ICS	T0816	Device Restart/Shutdown	Device Restart/Shutdown targets this object.
ICS	T0846	Remote System Discovery	Remote System Discovery targets this object.
ICS	T0884	Connection Proxy	Connection Proxy targets this object.
ICS	T0890	Exploitation for Privilege Escalation	Exploitation for Privilege Escalation targets this object.
ICS	T0893	Data from Local System	Data from Local System targets this object.
ICS	T1694.001	Default CredentialsSub-technique	Default Credentials targets this object.
ICS	T0871	Execution through API	Execution through API targets this object.
ICS	T1695	Block Communications	Block Communications targets this object.
ICS	T0846.003	Multicast DiscoverySub-technique	Multicast Discovery targets this object.
ICS	T0888	Remote System Information Discovery	Remote System Information Discovery targets this object.
ICS	T0846.002	Broadcast DiscoverySub-technique	Broadcast Discovery targets this object.
ICS	T0822	External Remote Services	External Remote Services targets this object.
ICS	T0869	Standard Application Layer Protocol	Standard Application Layer Protocol targets this object.
ICS	T0883	Internet Accessible Device	Internet Accessible Device targets this object.
ICS	T1695.002	EthernetSub-technique	Ethernet targets this object.
ICS	T0809	Data Destruction	Data Destruction targets this object.
ICS	T0820	Exploitation for Evasion	Exploitation for Evasion targets this object.
ICS	T0892	Change Credential	Change Credential targets this object.
ICS	T0807	Command-Line Interface	Command-Line Interface targets this object.
ICS	T0872	Indicator Removal on Host	Indicator Removal on Host targets this object.
ICS	T0814	Denial of Service	Denial of Service targets this object.
ICS	T0862	Supply Chain Compromise	Supply Chain Compromise targets this object.
ICS	T1693.001	System FirmwareSub-technique	System Firmware targets this object.
ICS	T0842	Network Sniffing	Network Sniffing targets this object.
ICS	T0853	Scripting	Scripting targets this object.
ICS	T0846.001	Port ScanSub-technique	Port Scan targets this object.
ICS	T1694	Insecure Credentials	Insecure Credentials targets this object.
ICS	T0885	Commonly Used Port	Commonly Used Port targets this object.
ICS	T0851	Rootkit	Rootkit targets this object.

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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: 1.1
Created: Sep 24, 2025, 17:53 UTC (UTC+00:00)
Modified: May 12, 2026, 15:12 UTC (UTC+00:00)
Raw hash: 23e390bd07c53f9b...

Imported snapshots across ATT&CK releases(1)

Release	Bundle imported	Object version	Modified	Status	Raw hash
19.1	Jul 14, 2026, 09:14 UTC (UTC+00:00)	1.1	May 12, 2026, 15:12 UTC (UTC+00:00)	Current bundle	`23e390bd07c5…`

Raw source

Mirrored ATT&CK source object

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Source references

External references and citations

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[1]
mitre-attackA0015
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