Adversaries may obtain and abuse credentials of a default account as a means of gaining Initial Access, Persistence, Privilege Escalation, or Defense Evasion. Default accounts are those that are built-into an OS, such as the Guest or Administrator accounts on Windows systems. Default accounts also include default factory/provider set accounts on other types of systems, software, or devices, including the root user account in AWS and the default service account in Kubernetes.(Citation: Microsoft Local Accounts Feb 2019)(Citation: AWS Root User)(Citation: Threat Matrix for Kubernetes)

Default accounts are not limited to client machines, rather also include accounts that are preset for equipment such as network devices and computer applications whether they are internal, open source, or commercial. Appliances that come preset with a username and password combination pose a serious threat to organizations that do not change it post installation, as they are easy targets for an adversary. Similarly, adversaries may also utilize publicly disclosed or stolen [Private Keys](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1552/004) or credential materials to legitimately connect to remote environments via [Remote Services](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1021).(Citation: Metasploit SSH Module)
Default Accounts
source_name: mitre-attack  url: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078/001  external_id: T1078.001     source_name: AWS Root User  description: Amazon. (n.d.). AWS Account Root User. Retrieved April 5, 2021.  url: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_root-user.html     source_name: Microsoft Local Accounts Feb 2019  description: Microsoft. (2018, December 9). Local Accounts. Retrieved February 11, 2019.  url: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security/identity-protection/access-control/local-accounts     source_name: Metasploit SSH Module  description: undefined. (n.d.). Retrieved April 12, 2019.  url: https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/tree/master/modules/exploits/linux/ssh     source_name: Threat Matrix for Kubernetes  description: Weizman, Y. (2020, April 2). Threat Matrix for Kubernetes. Retrieved March 30, 2021.  url: https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2020/04/02/attack-matrix-kubernetes/     