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MITRE ATT&CK® Malware

S1179: Exbyte

Exbyte is an exfiltration tool written in Go that is uniquely associated with BlackByte operations. Observed since 2022, Exbyte transfers collected files to online file sharing and hosting services.[1]

EnterpriseS1179MalwareObject v1.0Modified
Glexia's Take · Automated analysis

Security context for executives and security teams

Automation confidenceMedium

S1179: Exbyte describes [Exbyte](https://attack.mitre.org/software/S1179) is an exfiltration tool written in Go that is uniquely associated with [BlackByte](https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G1043) operations. Observed since 2022, [Exbyte](https://attack.mitre.org/software/S1179) transfers collected files to online file sharing and hosting services.(Citation: Symantec BlackByte 2022)

Executive priority

S1179: Exbyte is an official MITRE ATT&CK software. Glexia treats it as defensive behavior context for prioritizing monitoring, control validation, and response planning without using the object by itself as an attribution claim.

Technical view

Security teams should validate S1179: Exbyte by reviewing the official ATT&CK relationships, mapped tactics (the mapped ATT&CK tactic context), supported platforms (Windows), and available local telemetry before making detection or mitigation decisions.

Likely telemetry

  • Official ATT&CK relationships and object metadata
  • Network, endpoint, and security-tool telemetry

Detection direction

  • Validate whether S1179: Exbyte appears in your detection coverage and tabletop scenarios.
  • Use the object to align executive risk language with SOC, incident response, and detection engineering work.
  • Do not treat ATT&CK relationship context as attribution without corroborating evidence.

Mitigation priorities

  • Map the object to existing controls and identify missing telemetry or response ownership.
  • Prioritize mitigations that reduce exposure on the listed platforms and tactics.
  • Review adjacent ATT&CK relationships before changing policy, detections, or reporting language.
Additional notes and limits

Baseline Glexia take generated from the official MITRE ATT&CK STIX object, source hash, tactics, platforms, and detection fields. It is safe to replace with a richer model-generated take for the same source hash later.

This baseline take is source-grounded and schema-validated, but it does not include environment-specific telemetry, incident evidence, or threat-intelligence corroboration.

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

Official MITRE ATT&CK definition

Exbyte

Exbyte is an exfiltration tool written in Go that is uniquely associated with BlackByte operations. Observed since 2022, Exbyte transfers collected files to online file sharing and hosting services.[1]

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.

9 rows
DomainIDNameRelationship / procedure
EnterpriseT1106Native API

Exbyte calls `ShellExecuteW` with the `IpOperation` parameter `RunAs` to launch `explorer.exe` with elevated privileges.CitationMicrosoft BlackByte 2023

EnterpriseT1480Execution Guardrails

Exbyte checks for the presence of a configuration file before completing execution.CitationMicrosoft BlackByte 2023

EnterpriseT1069.001Local GroupsSub-technique

Exbyte checks whether the process is running with privileged local access during execution.CitationMicrosoft BlackByte 2023

EnterpriseT1140Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information

Exbyte decodes and decrypts data stored in the configuration file with a key provided on the command line during execution.CitationMicrosoft BlackByte 2023

EnterpriseT1083File and Directory Discovery

Exbyte enumerates all document files on an infected machine, then creates a summary of these items including filename and directory location prior to exfiltration to cloud hosting services.[1]

EnterpriseT1518.001Security Software DiscoverySub-technique

Exbyte checks for the presence of various security software products during execution.[1]

EnterpriseT1070.004File DeletionSub-technique

Exbyte will self-delete if a hard-coded configuration file is not found.CitationMicrosoft BlackByte 2023

EnterpriseT1497.001System ChecksSub-technique

Exbyte performs various checks to determine if it is running in a sandboxed environment to prevent analysis.[1]

EnterpriseT1567Exfiltration Over Web Service

Exbyte exfiltrates collected data to online file hosting sites such as `Mega.co.nz`.[1]CitationMicrosoft BlackByte 2023

Associated objects

Groups, software, and campaigns

GroupEnterprise

G1043: BlackByte

BlackByte is a ransomware threat actor operating since at least 2021. BlackByte is associated with several versions of ransomware also labeled BlackByte Ransomware. BlackByte ransomware operations initially used a common encryption key allowing for the development of a universal decryptor, but subsequent versions such as BlackByte 2.0 Ransomware use more robust encryption mechanisms. BlackByte is notable for operations targeting critical infrastructure entities among other targets across North America.[1][2][3][4][5]

Relationship explorer

All related ATT&CK context

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
19.2
Object version
1.0
Created
Modified
Raw hash
0de86a4d0a023006...
Imported snapshots across ATT&CK releases(2)
ReleaseBundle importedObject versionModifiedStatusRaw hash
19.21.0Current bundle0de86a4d0a02…
19.11.0Older bundle0de86a4d0a02…
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.

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]
    Symantec BlackByte 2022

    Symantec Threat Hunter Team. (2022, October 21). Exbyte: BlackByte Ransomware Attackers Deploy New Exfiltration Tool. Retrieved December 16, 2024.

    Open source URL
  2. [2]
    mitre-attackS1179
    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.