Skip to content
KitploitKITPLOIT
ToolsBlog
Submit
ToolsBlog
Submit

Hacking, PenTest, and Cybersecurity Tools for Your Security Arsenal!

Kitploit is a directory of hacking, cybersecurity, and pentesting tools. Discover the latest project updates to find vulnerabilities, analyze systems, automate testing, and strengthen your security.

··Feeds·Contact·Privacy·© 2026 Kitploit

Tool Directory

Categories

View all categories
Loading categories
PoisonApple — CLI tool for applying and removing macOS persistence mechanisms, designed for threat emulation and red team operations. Supports 17 techniques including LaunchAgents, Cron, and LoginHooks. | Kitploit
Tools/GitHubGitHub/cyborgsecurity/poisonapple
Persistence MechanismsPost-ExploitationRed Teaming
GitHubcyborgsecurity/poisonapple

PoisonApple

CLI tool for applying and removing macOS persistence mechanisms, designed for threat emulation and red team operations. Supports 17 techniques including LaunchAgents, Cron, and LoginHooks.

View Repository
229324 years agoReviewed by Kitploit

Most Popular

View all →

Discover the most used tools by our community.

Explore all tools

Browse our collection of tools

View all tools →
Share

PoisonApple

This is a command-line tool to perform various persistence mechanism techniques on macOS. This tool was designed to be used by threat hunters for cyber threat emulation purposes.

Install

Do it up:

root@kitploit:~
$ pip3 install poisonapple --user

Note: PoisonApple was written & tested using Python 3.9, it should work using Python 3.6+

Important Notes!

  • PoisonApple will make modifications to your macOS system, it's advised to only use PoisonApple on a virtual machine. Although any persistence mechanism technique added using this tool can also be easily removed (-r), please use with caution!
  • Be advised: This tool will likely cause common AV / EDR / other macOS security products to generate alerts.
  • To understand how any of these techniques work in-depth please see The Art of Mac Malware, Volume 1: Analysis - Chapter 0x2: Persistence by Patrick Wardle of Objective-See. It's a fantastic resource.

Usage

See PoisonApple switch options (--help):

root@kitploit:~
$ poisonapple --help
usage: poisonapple [-h] [-l] [-t TECHNIQUE] [-n NAME] [-c COMMAND] [-r]

Command-line tool to perform various persistence mechanism techniques on macOS.

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -l, --list            list available persistence mechanism techniques
  -t TECHNIQUE, --technique TECHNIQUE
                        persistence mechanism technique to use
  -n NAME, --name NAME  name for the file or label used for persistence
  -c COMMAND, --command COMMAND
                        command(s) to execute for persistence
  -r, --remove          remove persistence mechanism

List of available techniques:

root@kitploit:~
$ poisonapple --list
      ,       _______       __
  .-.:|.-.   |   _   .-----|__|-----.-----.-----.
.'        '. |.  |   |  |  |  |__ --|  |  |  |  |
'-."~".  .-' |.  ____|_____|__|_____|_____|__|__|
  } ` }  {   |:  |  _______             __
  } } }  {   |::.| |   _   .-----.-----|  |-----.
  } ` }  {   `---' |.  |   |  |  |  |  |  |  -__|
.-'"~"   '-.       |.  _   |   __|   __|__|_____|
'.        .'       |:  |   |__|  |__|
  '-_.._-'         |::.|:. |
                   `--- ---' v0.2.3

+--------------------+
| AtJob              |
+--------------------+
| Bashrc             |
+--------------------+
| Cron               |
+--------------------+
| CronRoot           |
+--------------------+
| Emond              |
+--------------------+
| Iterm2             |
+--------------------+
| LaunchAgent        |
+--------------------+
| LaunchAgentUser    |
+--------------------+
| LaunchDaemon       |
+--------------------+
| LoginHook          |
+--------------------+
| LoginHookUser      |
+--------------------+
| LoginItem          |
+--------------------+
| LogoutHook         |
+--------------------+
| LogoutHookUser     |
+--------------------+
| Periodic           |
+--------------------+
| Reopen             |
+--------------------+
| Zshrc              |
+--------------------+

Apply a persistence mechanism:

root@kitploit:~
$ poisonapple -t LaunchAgentUser -n testing
      ,       _______       __
  .-.:|.-.   |   _   .-----|__|-----.-----.-----.
.'        '. |.  |   |  |  |  |__ --|  |  |  |  |
'-."~".  .-' |.  ____|_____|__|_____|_____|__|__|
  } ` }  {   |:  |  _______             __
  } } }  {   |::.| |   _   .-----.-----|  |-----.
  } ` }  {   `---' |.  |   |  |  |  |  |  |  -__|
.-'"~"   '-.       |.  _   |   __|   __|__|_____|
'.        .'       |:  |   |__|  |__|
  '-_.._-'         |::.|:. |
                   `--- ---' v0.2.3

[+] Success! The persistence mechanism action was successful: LaunchAgentUser

If no command is specified (-c) a default trigger command will be used which writes to a file on the Desktop every time the persistence mechanism is triggered:

root@kitploit:~
$ cat ~/Desktop/PoisonApple-LaunchAgentUser
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:46:02 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:46:13 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:46:23 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:46:33 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:46:43 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:46:53 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:47:03 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:47:13 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:48:05 CDT 2021 
Triggered @ Tue Mar 23 17:48:15 CDT 2021

Remove a persistence mechanism:

root@kitploit:~
$ poisonapple -t LaunchAgentUser -n testing -r
...

Use a custom command:

root@kitploit:~
$ poisonapple -t LaunchAgentUser -n foo -c "echo foo >> /Users/user/Desktop/foo"
...
Download Tool