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Agent skill

Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon

by mukul975 in mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills

Detect malicious scheduled task creation and modification using Sysmon Event IDs 1 (Process Create for schtasks.exe), 11 (File Create for task XML), and Windows Security Event 4698/4702.

Apache-2.0Auto-check passedProductivity & Automation

Install Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon

skills CLI
$ npx skills add mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills --skill detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon -a claude-code

Project install by default; add -g for ~/.claude/skills/.

GitHub CLI
$ gh skill install mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon --agent claude-code

Project scope by default; add --scope user for a personal install. Needs GitHub CLI 2.90.0 or later (public preview).

Manual copy
$ git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills.git skills-src && mkdir -p .claude/skills && cp -r skills-src/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon .claude/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon && rm -rf skills-src

Use ~/.claude/skills/ instead of .claude/skills for a personal install. The folder must contain SKILL.md.

Claude Code skills documentation · loads skills from .claude/skills/

Facts

Skill name
detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon
GitHub stars
34k
Token cost
~741 tokens
SKILL.md length
213 words
Files
4 (incl. scripts, references)
Skills in repo
644
Repo updated
First seen
Licence
Apache-2.0

At a glance

Detect malicious scheduled task creation and modification using Sysmon Event IDs 1 (Process Create for schtasks.exe), 11 (File Create for task XML), and Windows Security Event 4698/4702.

  • Works in 5 steps: Configure Sysmon to log Event IDs 1, 11,… → Build detection rules for schtasks.exe… → Correlate Event 4698 (task registered)… → …
  • Tasks that involve Scheduled and recurring tasks
  • SKILL.md covers Overview, When to Use, Prerequisites and Steps, plus 1 more section
  • Runs Python scripts from its folder

What it does

Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon is an agent skill from mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills. Detect malicious scheduled task creation and modification using Sysmon Event IDs 1 (Process Create for schtasks.exe), 11 (File Create for task XML), and Windows Security Event 4698/4702. The analyst correlates task creation with suspicious parent processes, public directory paths, and encoded command arguments to identify persistence and lateral movement via scheduled tasks. Activates for requests involving scheduled task detection, Sysmon persistence hunting, or T1053.005 Scheduled Task/Job analysis.

Its SKILL.md is about 740 tokens, which your agent loads only when the skill is triggered. The skill folder holds 5 other files, including scripts and reference files (for example `references/api-reference.md` and `scripts/agent.py`).

It sits in Productivity & Automation, covering Scheduled and recurring tasks. The repository describes itself as: 817 structured cybersecurity skills for AI agents · Mapped to 6 frameworks: MITRE ATT&CK, NIST CSF 2.0, MITRE ATLAS, D3FEND, NIST AI RMF & MITRE F3 (Fight Fraud) · agentskills.io…. The licence is Apache-2.0.

When your agent uses it

  • Tasks that involve Scheduled and recurring tasks

Example prompts

  • “/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon”

Requirements

  • Python 3

Workflow steps

5 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

  1. Configure Sysmon to log Event IDs 1, 11, 12, 13 with task-related filters
  2. Build detection rules for schtasks.exe /create with suspicious arguments
  3. Correlate Event 4698 (task registered) with Sysmon Event 1 (process create)
  4. Hunt for tasks executing from public directories or with encoded commands
  5. Alert on remote task creation (schtasks /s) for lateral movement detection

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 54a7988. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

  • Tool permissions

    Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

    From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

  • Runs code

    Ships 1 file in scripts/ (Python), which the agent can run.

    From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

  • Network

    No URLs in SKILL.md.

    From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

  • Credentials

    Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

    From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon loads about 741 tokens when it runs, and up to ~1.3k if it reads all its reference files. Until then it costs about 139 tokens; SKILL.md has 213 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it
~139
When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches
~741
With references · SKILL.md plus every file in references/, read only if the agent opens them
~1.3k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Auto-check passed

The automated check found no risky patterns in SKILL.md.

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); the scripts in this folder are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills at commit 54a7988, republished under its Apache-2.0 licence (© mukul975). 213 words, ~741 tokens.

Download SKILL.mdSave it as .claude/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon/SKILL.md (or your agent's skills folder). This skill also uses 3 other files; get the full folder from GitHub.
name
detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon
description
Detect malicious scheduled task creation and modification using Sysmon Event IDs 1 (Process Create for schtasks.exe), 11 (File Create for task XML), and Windows Security Event 4698/4702. The analyst correlates task creation with suspicious parent processes, public directory paths, and encoded command arguments to identify persistence and lateral movement via scheduled tasks. Activates for requests involving scheduled task detection, Sysmon persistence hunting, or T1053.005 Scheduled Task/Job analysis.
domain
cybersecurity
subdomain
threat-hunting
tags
sysmon, scheduled-tasks, persistence, detection, threat-hunting, windows-security
version
1.0
author
mahipal
license
Apache-2.0
d3fend_techniques
Execution Isolation, Process Termination, Hardware-based Process Isolation, Platform Monitoring, Process Suspension
nist_csf
DE.CM-01, DE.AE-02, DE.AE-07, ID.RA-05
mitre_attack
T1046, T1057, T1082, T1083, T1021

Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks with Sysmon

Overview

Adversaries abuse Windows Task Scheduler (schtasks.exe, at.exe) for persistence (T1053.005) and lateral movement. Sysmon Event ID 1 captures schtasks.exe process creation with full command-line arguments, while Event ID 11 captures task XML files written to C:\Windows\System32\Tasks. Windows Security Event 4698 logs task registration details. This skill covers building detection rules that correlate these events to identify malicious scheduled tasks created from suspicious paths, with encoded payloads, or targeting remote systems.

When to Use

  • When investigating security incidents that require detecting malicious scheduled tasks with sysmon
  • When building detection rules or threat hunting queries for this domain
  • When SOC analysts need structured procedures for this analysis type
  • When validating security monitoring coverage for related attack techniques

Prerequisites

  • Sysmon installed with a detection-focused configuration (e.g., SwiftOnSecurity or Olaf Hartong)
  • Windows Event Log forwarding to SIEM (Splunk, Elastic, or Sentinel)
  • PowerShell ScriptBlock Logging enabled (Event 4104)

Steps

  1. Configure Sysmon to log Event IDs 1, 11, 12, 13 with task-related filters
  2. Build detection rules for schtasks.exe /create with suspicious arguments
  3. Correlate Event 4698 (task registered) with Sysmon Event 1 (process create)
  4. Hunt for tasks executing from public directories or with encoded commands
  5. Alert on remote task creation (schtasks /s) for lateral movement detection

Expected Output

[CRITICAL] Suspicious Scheduled Task Detected
  Task: \Microsoft\Windows\UpdateCheck
  Command: powershell.exe -enc SQBuAHYAbwBrAGUALQBXAGUAYgBSAGU...
  Created By: DOMAIN\compromised_user
  Parent Process: cmd.exe (PID 4532)
  Source: \\192.168.1.50 (remote creation)
  MITRE: T1053.005 - Scheduled Task/Job

© mukul975, Apache-2.0. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

SKILL.md and 3 other files (scripts, references) in skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon of mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills.

  • SKILL.md
  • LICENSE
  • references/api-reference.md
  • scripts/agent.py

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 54a7988

Compare with similar skills

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Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon compared with similar skills
SkillStarsUsed inTokensAuto-checkLicenceRepo updated
Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon this skillmukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills34k—~741Automated safety check: PassApache-2.0
ScheduleTinyAGI/tinyagi3.6k—~1.4kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Send User MessageTinyAGI/tinyagi3.6k—~829Automated safety check: PassMIT
Cron Opsczl9707/build-your-own-openclaw1.9k—~593Automated safety check: PassMIT
X Bookmarkssharbelxyz/x-bookmarks289—~2kAutomated safety check: NotesNone
Wp Wpcli And OpsAutomattic/agent-skills2112 repos~988Automated safety check: PassNone

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Categories

Questions about Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon

What does Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon do?

Detect malicious scheduled task creation and modification using Sysmon Event IDs 1 (Process Create for schtasks.exe), 11 (File Create for task XML), and Windows Security Event 4698/4702. Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon is an agent skill from mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills.exe), 11 (File Create for task XML), and Windows Security Event 4698/4702.

When should I use Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon?

Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon fits situations like: tasks that involve Scheduled and recurring tasks.

How do I install Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon in Claude Code?

Run `npx skills add mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills --skill detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon -a claude-code`. Or copy the skill folder (skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon in mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills) into .claude/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon in your project. Claude Code loads it when a task matches its description.

How do I install Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon in Codex?

Run `npx skills add mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills --skill detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon -a codex`. Or copy the skill folder (skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon in mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills) into .agents/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon in your project. Codex loads it when a task matches its description.

Can I use Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon in Cursor, Gemini CLI or GitHub Copilot?

Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot and OpenCode also load SKILL.md folders. With the skills CLI, run `npx skills add mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills --skill detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon -a cursor` (or -a gemini-cli, github-copilot or opencode for the others). To copy it by hand, put the folder in .cursor/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon, .gemini/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon, .github/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon and .opencode/skills/detecting-malicious-scheduled-tasks-with-sysmon in your project.

What does Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon need to run?

Going by SKILL.md and its folder, Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon needs Python for the scripts in its folder. Our summary lists: Python 3.

Does Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon access the network?

SKILL.md contains no URLs. Any network use would come from the scripts or tools the agent runs. This is read from the text; nothing was executed.

Is Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon safe to install?

Our automated static check of SKILL.md found no risky patterns, such as piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files or hidden Unicode. It is not a guarantee. The check reads SKILL.md only: the scripts in the folder are not scanned, so read them before running anything.

What licence does Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon use?

Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon is published under the Apache-2.0 licence (declared in SKILL.md). It allows redistribution, so the full SKILL.md is shown on this page.

How many tokens does Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon use?

About 741 tokens (SKILL.md is roughly 3k characters). Agents keep only the skill's name and description in context until a task matches; then they load SKILL.md in full. Its references folder adds about 588 tokens, read only when the agent opens those files.

What are the alternatives to Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon?

Skills that share tags, products or a category with Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon: Schedule (TinyAGI/tinyagi, 3.6k stars), Send User Message (TinyAGI/tinyagi, 3.6k stars), Cron Ops (czl9707/build-your-own-openclaw, 1.9k stars) and X Bookmarks (sharbelxyz/x-bookmarks, 289 stars). The comparison table on this page puts their stars, adoption, token cost, safety result and licence side by side.

Who maintains Detecting Malicious Scheduled Tasks With Sysmon?

mukul975 (a GitHub user) maintains it in mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills, which has 34,116 GitHub stars. The repository holds 644 skills in this directory. The repository was last updated on August 31, 2026.

Source: mukul975/Anthropic-Cybersecurity-Skills on GitHub. Facts on this page come from the repository at the commit we read; the author's words are quoted as theirs.