Definition
Monitoring changes in user web session behavior by comparing current web session activity to a baseline behavior profile or a catalog of predetermined malicious behavior.
How it works
User web session data is collected over a period of time to create a user behavior profile. Data collected includes clicks made on a website, average time between clicks, filling out web forms, order in which pages are viewed, and downloading files. Current user web session behavior is then compared against the use behavior profile to identify anomalies and a likelihood that the current user web session is malicious. Current user web session behavior can also be compared to predetermined known malicious behavior profiles that are developed through analysis of malware in run time at a threat research facility.
Considerations
- Potential for false positives from anomalies that are not associated with malicious activity.
- Attackers may not differentiate their web session activity enough to trigger an alert.
Implementation perspective
Web Session Activity Analysis should be treated as a technical defensive capability rather than a product checkbox. In practice, teams should define the protected scope, the conditions under which the technique acts, and the observable evidence that demonstrates the intended behavior. For this technique, likely engineering context includes the relevant system, activity, and evidence sources.
Use the technique to identify suspicious, unauthorized, or abnormal activity through observable evidence and repeatable analysis.
Questions to ask
- Which events, states, or artifacts must be observed for the analysis to work?
- What analytic logic, threshold, comparison, or signature turns observations into a finding?
- How are expected false positives, blind spots, and environmental variations documented?
- Who receives the result, and what action is expected when the technique produces a finding?
Evidence and validation
- Telemetry and data-source configuration records
- Analytic logic, thresholds, signatures, and version history
- Test cases demonstrating expected positive and negative results
- Alert, triage, escalation, and tuning records
Common failure patterns
- Required telemetry is missing, delayed, or transformed in a way that invalidates the analysis.
- The technique produces alerts without an accountable triage and response process.
- Detection coverage is claimed from product deployment without testing the relevant analytic behavior.
This implementation perspective is original Bare Metal Cyber educational content. It does not replace the official D3FEND definition or establish that a specific product implements the technique.
Technique hierarchy
Top-level family
Parent techniques
Direct child techniques
None listed at this level.
Artifacts and ontology entities
These relationships describe how D3FEND connects a defensive technique to artifacts or other ontology entities. They describe graph semantics, not a product certification.
Explicit technique relationships
ATT&CK Enterprise mitigation relationships
These links come from the D3FEND ontology’s ATT&CK mitigation mapping. They help users navigate between the knowledge bases and do not guarantee mitigation effectiveness.
Authoritative sources
- Open this technique on the official D3FEND website ↗
- Open the official ontology resources ↗
- Host intrusion prevention system using software and user behavior analysis ↗Sophos Ltd · Clifford C. Wright · PatentReference
- System and Method for Detection of a Change in Behavior in the Use of a Website Through Vector Velocity Analysis ↗Silver Tail Systems · Mike Eynon; Laura Mather; Erik Westland; Jim Lloyd · PatentReference
- System and Method for Network Security Including Detection of Attacks Through Partner Websites ↗EMC IP Holding Co LLC · Matt Frantz; Andreas Wittenstein; Mike Eynon; Laura Mather; Jim Lloyd; James Schumacher; Duane Murphy · PatentReference
- System and method thereof for identifying and responding to security incidents based on preemptive forensics ↗Palo Alto Networks Inc · Gil BARAK; Shai MORAG · PatentReference
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