ArgusMonitor.sys
ArgusMonitor.sys is the kernel driver for the Argus Monitor hardware temperature monitoring and fan control application by Argotronic UG (Germany). The driver exposes 47 IOCTLs providing arbitrary physical memory read/write via MmMapIoSpace (32 map slots, up to 128KB) with a single-shot read primitive that bypasses the address restriction (busNum=0xFF), unrestricted port I/O (any port 0x0000-0xFFFF), PCI configuration space read/write via HalGetBusDataByOffset and HalSetBusDataByOffset, MSR read/write with a whitelist that blocks IA32_LSTAR but allows IA32_MISC_ENABLE write (can disable NX/XD system-wide), and I2C/SMBus access via MMIO bit-banging. The driver uses IoCreateDevice with no DACL and IRP_MJ_CREATE returns STATUS_SUCCESS immediately with no caller validation. A handshake IOCTL accepts a user-chosen 0x200-byte XOR keypad (sending all zeros effectively disables the XOR layer). WHQL attestation signed with an active Microsoft certificate. KASLR bypass confirmed via physical memory PE header scan. Loads on any x64 Windows without ArgusMonitor software.
Known samples 1
1 recorded TRUE · 0 recorded FALSE · 0 unknown for loading despite HVCI. Results apply to individual samples.
ArgusMonitor.sysSample 1 · HVCI TRUE
- MD5
2b4c57b09ffd3bedfe33416eb78fddee- SHA1
f1bf09e1932863e0e29cbdef2db5c5fe48b4015c- SHA256
df9b2892498c68805fdc0fabb369f8bcf011e784898cb32fdc5d85f6123f1126- Imphash
4b49c58600454042bacf975ac70550e3- Authentihash MD5
a944c88ef70fa8fe19f81881f5aae9e6- Authentihash SHA1
87688ce7d806c8dfd74e553b2e834de6cfecc985- Authentihash SHA256
8aa91af14c3af2a7491d07a24886d5750e28886d96b442cd60ac8ee1d144f961- Machine
- AMD64
- Version
- 2.40.2
- Publisher
- Argotronic eGbR
Recorded command
sc.exe create ArgusMonitor binPath=C:\windows\temp\ArgusMonitor.sys type=kernel && sc.exe start ArgusMonitorElevate privileges · Privileges: kernel · OS: Windows 10
Research & references
Acknowledgement: Patrick Saif @weezerOSINT

