Adversaries may target insecure credentials as a means to persist on a system or device or move laterally from one system or device to another. Insecure credentials may appear as default credentials which are pre-configured credentials on a system, device, or software that are well-known in documentation or hard-coded credentials which are built into the system, device, or software that cannot be changed or not easily changed because of the impact on control processes.(Citation: NIST SP 800-82r3)(Citation: ICS-ALERT-13-164-01)(Citation: OT IceFall) Adversaries often times use insecure credentials to evade detection as they are typically forgotten about by system and device owners.
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