Title

Microsoft Defender AV must enable script scanning. (Cat II impact)

Discussion

Always-on protection consists of real-time protection, behavior monitoring, and heuristics to identify malware based on known suspicious and malicious activities. These activities include events, such as processes making unusual changes to existing files, modifying or creating automatic startup registry keys and startup locations (also known as autostart extensibility points, or ASEPs), and other changes to the file system or file structure.

Check Content

Verify the policy value for Computer Configuration >> Administrative Templates >> Windows Components >> Microsoft Defender Antivirus >> Real-time Protection >> Turn on script scanning is set to "Enabled"; otherwise, this is a finding. Procedure: Use the Windows Registry Editor to navigate to the following key: HKLM\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender\Real-Time Protection Criteria: If the value "DisableScriptScanning" is REG_DWORD = 0, this is not a finding. If the value is 1, this is a finding.

Fix Text

Set the policy value for Computer Configuration >> Administrative Templates >> Windows Components >> Microsoft Defender Antivirus >> Real-time Protection >> Turn on script scanning to "Enabled". Click "OK". Click "Apply".

Additional Identifiers

Rule ID: SV-278668r1144063_rule

Vulnerability ID: V-278668

Group Title: SRG-APP-000278

Expert Comments

CCIs tied to check.

Controls tied to check. These are derived from the CCIs shown above.