msaccess.exe

Microsoft Office's database management application. tldr-pages

LOLBAS Download 2 Sigma rules name it 1 ATT&CK technique 1 documented command 1 known copy with hashes

How msaccess.exe is abused

documented by LOLBAS

Download T1105 Ingress Tool Transfer

Each abuse is LOLBAS's category and the options and words it uses; the full write-up is on LOLBAS's page for msaccess.exe.

1 documented command

from LOLBAS, each read by the identifier

Download T1105 Ingress Tool Transfer User privileges

Downloads payload from remote server

MSAccess.exe {REMOTEURL}

Identify

The command the identifier reads trips no Sigma process-creation rule. These commands and their descriptions are from LOLBAS’s entry for msaccess.exe, by Nir Chako, at commit 2056cb766250 of 2026-09-26, under the GPL-3.0 and LOLBAS’s notice, with no warranty. Changed: Markdown is shown formatted. The source is in lolbas-gtfobins-commands.json.gz, and the full entry is on LOLBAS’s page for msaccess.exe. The identifier reads it with LOLBAS’s placeholders filled in: a URL as https://example.com/file, a share as \\192.0.2.10\share\file, a path as C:\Data\file and a command as calc.exe.

What detects it

Sigma process creation rules

highRenamed Office Binary ExecutionNasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)

mediumSuspicious New Instance Of An Office COM ObjectNasreddine Bencherchali (Nextron Systems)

T1105Ingress Tool Transfer

Is it the real msaccess.exe?

file version info and known copies

Installed inC:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\

Signed byMicrosoft Corporation

ProductMicrosoft Office, Microsoft Corporation

DescriptionMicrosoft Access

1 known copy

16.0.12527.20482 · C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\MSACCESS.EXE · signed by Microsoft Corporation

a59bec6bfeb33cd5beb8c98f1719bea48c220e418e47f06824b284b5b943531a

From the file’s version info and the copies recorded by xCyclopedia (MIT). A copy in another folder, signed by someone else or with another hash is not necessarily malicious, but it is worth a closer look. In Ceplin, "<sha256>".whatis() says which known copy a hash is.

Everyday use

from tldr-pages, CC BY 4.0

Launch the database application

msaccessIdentify

Open an existing database file

msaccess path\to\file.accdbIdentify

Open an existing database file in read-only mode

msaccess /ro path\to\fileaccdbIdentify

None of the 3 examples the identifier reads matches LOLBAS abuse or trips a Sigma process-creation rule.