Ukraine CERT-UA warned of cyber attacks targeting defense forces with SPECTR malware as part of a cyber espionage campaign dubbed SickSync.
The Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine (CERT-UA) warned of cyber espionage campaign targeting defense forces in the country. The Ukrainian CERT attributes the attack to the threat actor UAC-0020 which employed a malware called SPECTR as part of the campaign tracked as SickSync.
The threat actor UAC-0020, aka Vermin, operates under the control of the law enforcement agencies of the temporarily occupied Luhansk.
The SPECTR malware has been active since at least 2019, it allows operators to steal sensitive data and files from the infected computer, it relies on the standard synchronization functionality of the legitimate SyncThing software.
Threat actors sent out spear-phishing messages with an attachment in the form of a password-protected archive named “turrel.fop.vovchok.rar”.
The archive contains another archive, named RARSFX archive (“turrel.fop.ovchok.sfx.rar.scr”) that contains the “Wowchok.pdf” decoy file, the “sync.exe” EXE installer created using InnoSetup, and the BAT file ” run_user.bat” used for initial startup.
The UA-CERT states that the “sync.exe” file contains the legitimate SyncThing components and SPECTR malware files, including additional libraries and scripts. Attackers modified the standard files of the SyncThing software to change the names of directories, scheduled tasks, disable the functionality of displaying messages to the user, etc.
The SPECTR information stealer can capture screenshots every 10 seconds, collect files, extract data from removable USB drives, and steal credentials from web browsers and applications like Element, Signal, Skype, and Telegram.
“It should be noted that the stolen information is copied to subfolders in the directory %APPDATA%\sync\Slave_Sync\, after which, using the standard synchronization functionality of the legitimate program SyncThing , the contents of these directories get to the attacker’s computer, which ensures data exfiltration.” reads the report from the CERT-UA. “From the point of view of network indicators (in case of confidence in not using the mentioned technology is authorized), taking into account the establishment of a peer-to-peer connection, among other things, we recommend paying attention to signs of interaction with the SyncThing infrastructure: *.syncthing.net.”
The report also includes indicators of cyber threats.
Morphisec researchers observed a threat actor, tracked as Sticky Werewolf, targeting entities in Russia and Belarus.
Sticky Werewolf is a threat actor that was first spotted in April 2023, initially targeting public organizations in Russia and Belarus. The group has expanded its operations to various sectors, including a pharmaceutical company and a Russian research institute specializing in microbiology and vaccine development.
In their latest campaign, Sticky Werewolf targeted the aviation industry with emails supposedly from the First Deputy General Director of AO OKB Kristall, a Moscow-based company involved in aircraft and spacecraft production and maintenance. Previously, the group used phishing emails with links to malicious files. In the latest campaign, the threat actor used archive files containing LNK files that pointed to a payload stored on WebDAV servers.
After executing the binary hosted on a WebDAV server, an obfuscated Windows batch script is launched. The script runs an AutoIt script that ultimately injects the final payload.
“In previous campaigns, the infection chain began with phishing emails containing a link to download a malicious file from platforms like gofile.io. However, in their latest campaign, the infection method has changed.” reads the analysis published by Morphisec. “The initial email includes an archive attachment; when the recipient extracts the archive, they find LNK and decoy files. These LNK files point to an executable hosted on a WebDAV server. Once executed, this initiates a Batch script, which then launches an AutoIt script that ultimately injects the final payload.”
The archive includes a decoy PDF File and two LNK Files Masquerading as DOCX Documents named Повестка совещания.docx.lnk (Meeting agenda) and Список рассылки.docx.lnk (Mailing list) respectively.
The threat actor used phishing messages allegedly sent by the First Deputy General Director and Executive Director of AO OKB Kristall. The recipients are individuals from the aerospace and defense sector who are invited to a video conference on future cooperation. The messages use a password-protected archive containing a malicious payload.
The payloads employed by the threat actors include commodity RATs or stealers. Recently, Sticky Werewolf was spotted using Rhadamanthys Stealer and Ozone RAT in their campaigns. In previous attacks the group also deployed MetaStealer, DarkTrack, and NetWire.
“These malwares enable extensive espionage and data exfiltration. While there is no definitive evidence of Sticky Werewolf’s national origin, the geopolitical context suggests possible links to a pro-Ukrainian cyberespionage group or hacktivists, though this attribution remains uncertain.” concludes the report that also includes Indicators of Compromise (IoCs).
Chinese cyberespionage group Velvet Ant was spotted using custom malware to target F5 BIG-IP appliances to breach target networks.
In late 2023, Sygnia researchers responded to an incident suffered by a large organization that they attributed to a China-linked threat actor tracked as ‘Velvet Ant.’
The cyberspies deployed custom malware on F5 BIG-IP appliances to gain persistent access to the internal network of the target organization and steal sensitive data.
The investigation revealed that the threat actor had been present in the organization’s on-premises network for about three years, aiming to maintain access for espionage purposes. They achieved persistence by establishing multiple footholds within the company’s environment. One method used was exploiting a legacy F5 BIG-IP appliance exposed to the internet, which served as an internal Command and Control (C&C). When one foothold was discovered and remediated, the threat actor quickly adapted and pivoted to another. This demonstrated their agility and deep understanding of the target’s network infrastructure.
The investigation revealed that the Chinese hackers had been present in the organization’s on-premises network for about three years. They achieved persistence by establishing multiple footholds within the company’s environment. One method used was exploiting a legacy internet-facing F5 BIG-IP appliance, which was also used by attackers as an internal Command and Control (C&C). After the researchers discovered and remediated one foothold, the APT group quickly pivoted to another. This demonstrated their agility and deep understanding of the target’s network infrastructure.
“The compromised organization had two F5 BIG-IP appliances which provided services such as firewall, WAF, load balancing and local traffic management. These appliances were directly exposed to the internet, and both of which were compromised. Both F5 appliances were running an outdated, vulnerable, operating system. The threat actor may have leveraged one of the vulnerabilities to gain remote access to the appliances.” reads the analysis published by Sygnia. “As a result, a backdoor hidden within the F5 appliance can evade detection from traditional log monitoring solutions.”
Once the attackers had compromised the F5 BIG-IP appliances, they gained access to internal file servers and deployed the PlugX RAT. The PlugX RAT was used by multiple Chinese APT groups in cyberespionage campaigns over the years.
Forensic analysis of the F5 appliances revealed that the Velvet Ant group also used the following malware in their attacks:
VELVETSTING – a tool that connects to the threat actor’s C&C once an hour, searching commands to execute. Once the tool received a command, it was executed via ‘csh’ (Unix C shell).
VELVETTAP – a tool with the ability to capture network packets.
SAMRID – identified as ‘EarthWorm’, an open-source SOCKS proxy tunneller available on GitHub. The tool was utilized in the past by multiple China-linked APT groups, including ‘Volt Typhoon’, ‘APT27’ and ‘Gelsemium’.
ESRDE – a tool with similar capabilities to that of ‘VELVETSTING’, but with minor differences, such as using bash instead of ‘csh’.
Researchers provided the following recommendations for organizations to mitigate attacks of groups like Velvet Ant:
Limit outbound internet traffic.
Limit lateral movement throughout the network.
Enhance security hardening of legacy servers.
Mitigate credential harvesting.
Protect public-facing devices.
The report also includes indicators of compromise for the attack analyzed by the researchers.
A China-linked cyber espionage group has compromised telecom operators in an Asian country since at least 2021.
The Symantec Threat Hunter Team reported that an alleged China-linked APT group has infiltrated several telecom operators in a single, unnamed, Asian country at least since 2021.
The threat actors used tools associated with Chinese espionage groups, they planted multiple backdoors on the networks of targeted companies to steal credentials.
“The attacks have been underway since at least 2021, with evidence to suggest that some of this activity may even date as far back as 2020. Virtually all of the organizations targeted were telecoms operators, with the addition of a services company that serves the telecoms sector and a university in another Asian country.” reads the report published by Broadcom Symantec Threat Hunter Team.
Evidence collected by the experts suggests that the cluster activity may have been active since 2020.
In a recent espionage campaign, the attackers employed custom malware associated with several Chinese APT groups. Some of the malware used by the threat actors are:
Coolclient: A backdoor linked to the Fireant group (also known as Mustang Panda or Earth Preta). It logs keystrokes, manages files, and communicates with a C2 server. This campaign used a version of VLC Media Player (disguised as googleupdate.exe) to sideload a Coolclient loader, which then reads and executes encrypted payloads.
Quickheal: A backdoor associated with the Needleminer group (also known as RedFoxtrot or Nomad Panda). The variant used by the attackers in recent attacks was a 32-bit DLL that communicated with a hardcoded C&C server using a custom protocol mimicking SSL traffic.
Rainyday: A backdoor, linked to the Firefly group (also known as Naikon), was used in a recent espionage campaign.
In addition to utilizing custom backdoors. the cyber espionage group also employed a range of tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) to compromise their targets. They deployed custom keylogging malware, port scanning tools, credential theft through the dumping of registry hives, a publicly available tool known as Responder that acts as a Link-Local Multicast Name Resolution (LLMNR) NetBIOS Name Service (NBT-NS) and multicast DNS (mDNS) poisoner, and enabling RDP.
“Tools used in this campaign have strong associations with multiple Chinese groups and at least three of the custom backdoors deployed are believed to be used exclusively by Chinese espionage actors.” concludes the report.” “The nature of the link between the actors involved in the current campaign remains unclear. Possibilities include, but are not limited to:
Attacks by multiple actors, acting independently of one another.
A single actor using tools and/or personnel acquired from or shared by other groups.
Multiple actors collaborating in a single campaign.
The ultimate motive of the intrusion campaign remains unclear.”
French information security agency ANSSI reported that Russia-linked threat actor Nobelium is behind a series of cyber attacks that targeted French diplomatic entities.
The French information security agency ANSSI reported that Russia-linked APT Nobelium targeted French diplomatic entities. Despite the French agency linked the attacks to the cyberespionage group Nobelium (aka APT29, SVR group, Cozy Bear, Midnight Blizzard, BlueBravo, and The Dukes), ANSSI differentiates these groups into separate threat clusters, including a group named Dark Halo, which was responsible for the 2020 SolarWinds attack.
October 2020, used against high-value targets, most likely for espionage purposes. Western diplomatic entities, such as embassies and Ministries of Foreign Affairs, account for the majority of known victims of Nobelium. However, several IT companies have also reported that they have been targeted by Nobelium’s operators in late 2023 and 2024.
The report published by ANSSI is based upon elements collected by the French agency, evidence shared by its national partners (known as C4 members), and publicly available reports. The document warns of phishing campaigns conducted by Nobelium against French public and diplomatic entities aiming at gathering strategic intelligence.
“Nobelium is characterized by the use of specific codes, tactics, technics and procedures. Most of Nobelium campaigns against diplomatic entities use compromised legitimate email accounts belonging to diplomatic staff, and conduct phishing campaigns against diplomatic institutions, embassies and consulates.” reads the report published by ANSSI. “These activities are also publicly described as a campaign called “Diplomatic Orbiter”.”
Attackers forge lure documents to target diplomatic staff, attempting to deliver their custom loaders to drop public post-exploitation tools such as Cobalt Strike or Brute Ratel C4. The tools allows attackers to access the victim’s network, perform lateral movements, drop additional payloads, maintain persistence, and exfiltrate valuable intelligence.
The agency confirmed that several IT companies have also reported being targeted by Nobelium in late 2023 and 2024.
“French public organisations have been targeted several times by phishing emails sent from foreign institutions previously compromised by Nobelium’s operators.” continues the report. “From February to May 2021, Nobelium operators conducted several phishing campaigns3 exploiting compromised email accounts belonging to the French Ministry of Culture and the National Agency for Territorial Cohesion (ANCT), sending an attachment called “Strategic Review”.”
In March 2022, a European embassy in South Africa received a phishing email that impersonated a French embassy, announcing the closure after a terrorist attack. The attackers sent the email from a compromised account of a French diplomat. In April and May 2022, Nobelium phishing messages reached dozens of email addresses from the French Ministry of Foreign Affair. Threat actors used themes like the closure of a Ukrainian embassy or a meeting with a Portuguese ambassador.
In May 2023, Nobelium targeted several European embassies in Kyiv, including the French embassy, with a phishing campaign involving an email about a “Diplomatic car for sale.” The ANSSI also reported a failed attempt to compromise the French Embassy in Romania.
“ANSSI has observed a high level of activities linked to Nobelium against the recent backdrop of geopolitical tensions, especially in Europe, in relation to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. Nobelium’s activities against government and diplomatic entities represent a national security concern and endanger French and European diplomatic interests. The targeting of IT and cybersecurity entities for espionage purposes by Nobelium operators potentially strengthens their offensive capabilities and the threat they represent.” concludes the report that also provides indicators of compromise. “Nobelium’s techniques, tactics, and procedures remain mainly constant over time.”
The unauthorized access to the IT infrastructure of the company occurred on June 26, threat actors used the credentials of a standard employee account within its IT environment.
Upon detecting the suspicious activity by this account, the company immediately started the incident response measures.
“A comprehensive taskforce consisting of TeamViewer’s security team together with globally leading cyber security experts has worked 24/7 on investigating the incident with all means available. We are in constant exchange with additional threat intelligence providers and relevant authorities to inform the investigation.” reads the statement published by the company.
“Current findings of the investigation point to an attack on Wednesday, June 26, tied to credentials of a standard employee account within our Corporate IT environment. Based on continuous security monitoring, our teams identified suspicious behavior of this account and immediately put incident response measures into action. Together with our external incident response support, we currently attribute this activity to the threat actor known as APT29 / Midnight Blizzard. Based on current findings of the investigation, the attack was contained within the Corporate IT environment and there is no evidence that the threat actor gained access to our product environment or customer data.”
An update published by TeamViewer states that findings confirmed that the attack on its infrastructure was limited to its internal corporate IT environment and did not affect the product environment, connectivity platform, or any customer data.
The popular Ars Technica reporter Dan Goodin reported that an alert issued by security firm NCC Group reports a “significant compromise of the TeamViewer remote access and support platform by an APT group.”
In May 2019, the German newspaper Der Spiegel revealed that the German software company behind TeamViewer was compromised in 2016 by Chinese hackers.
According to the media outlet, Chinese state-sponsored hackers used the Winnti trojan malware to infect the systems of the Company.
The Winnti group was first spotted by Kaspersky in 2013, according to the researchers, the nation-state actor has been active since at least 2007.
The gang is financially-motivated and was mostly involved in cyber espionage campaigns. The hackers were known for targeting companies in the online gaming industry, the majority of the victims are located in Southeast Asia.
The Winnti cyberespionage group is known for its ability in targeting supply chains of legitimate software to spread malware.
According to the company, it was targeted by the hackers in autumn 2016, when its experts detected suspicious activities were quickly blocked them to prevent major damages.
TeamViewer spokesperson revealed that the company investigated the attempts of intrusion, but did not find any evidence of exposure for customer data and sensitive data.
Der Spiegel pointed out that TeamViewer did not disclose the security breach to the public.
“In autumn 2016, TeamViewer was target of a cyber-attack. Our systems detected the suspicious activities in time to prevent any major damage. An expert team of internal and external cyber security researchers, working together closely with the responsible authorities, successfully fended off the attack and with all available means of IT forensics found no evidence that customer data or other sensitive information had been stolen, that customer computer systems had been infected or that the TeamViewer source code had been manipulated, stolen or misused in any other way.” said company spokesman.
“Out of an abundance of caution, TeamViewer conducted a comprehensive audit of its security architecture and IT infrastructure subsequently and further strengthened it with appropriate measures.”
At the time the company published a statement to exclude it was breached by hackers:
“Göppingen/Germany, May 23, 2016. A recent article warns, “TeamViewer users have had their bank accounts emptied by hackers gaining full-system access”. TeamViewer is appalled by any criminal activity; however, the source of the problem, according to our research, is careless use, not a potential security breach on TeamViewer’s side.” wrote the company.
Only in 2019, the company admitted it was breached in 2016.
Cisco fixed an actively exploited NX-OS zero-day, the flaw was exploited to install previously unknown malware as root on vulnerable switches.
Cisco addressed an NX-OS zero-day, tracked as CVE-2024-20399 (CVSS score of 6.0), that the China-linked group Velvet Ant exploited to deploy previously unknown malware as root on vulnerable switches.
The flaw resides in the CLI of Cisco NX-OS Software, an authenticated, local attacker can exploit the flaw to execute arbitrary commands as root on the underlying operating system of an affected device.
“This vulnerability is due to insufficient validation of arguments that are passed to specific configuration CLI commands. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by including crafted input as the argument of an affected configuration CLI command.” reads the advisory published by Cisco. “A successful exploit could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary commands on the underlying operating system with the privileges of root.”
The IT giant pointed out that only attackers with Administrator credentials can successfully exploit this vulnerability on a Cisco NX-OS device.
In April 2024, researchers reported to the Cisco Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT) that the issue was actively exploited in the wild.
Cybersecurity firm Sygnia observed the attacks on April 2024 and reported them to Cisco.
“Sygnia identified that CVE-2024-20399 was exploited in the wild by a China-nexus threat group as a ‘zero-day’ and shared the details of the vulnerability with Cisco. By exploiting this vulnerability, a threat group – dubbed ‘Velvet Ant’ – successfully executed commands on the underlying operating system of Cisco Nexus devices.” reads the report published by Sygnia. “This exploitation led to the execution of a previously unknown custom malware that allowed the threat group to remotely connect to compromised Cisco Nexus devices, upload additional files, and execute code on the devices.“
The vulnerability impacts the following devices:
MDS 9000 Series Multilayer Switches (CSCwj97007)
Nexus 3000 Series Switches (CSCwj97009)
Nexus 5500 Platform Switches (CSCwj97011)
Nexus 5600 Platform Switches (CSCwj97011)
Nexus 6000 Series Switches (CSCwj97011)
Nexus 7000 Series Switches (CSCwj94682) *
Nexus 9000 Series Switches in standalone NX-OS mode (CSCwj97009)
Cisco recommends customers monitor the use of credentials for the administrative users network-admin and vdc-admin.
Cisco provides the Cisco Software Checker to help customers determine if their devices are vulnerable to this flaw.
In late 2023, Sygnia researchers responded to an incident suffered by a large organization that they attributed to the same China-linked threat actor ‘Velvet Ant.’
The cyberspies deployed custom malware on F5 BIG-IP appliances to gain persistent access to the internal network of the target organization and steal sensitive data.
Multiple cybersecurity agencies released a joint advisory warning about a China-linked group APT40 ‘s capability to rapidly exploit disclosed security flaws.
Cybersecurity agencies from Australia, Canada, Germany, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, the U.K., and the U.S. released a joint advisory warning about the China-linked group APT40 (aka TEMP.Periscope, TEMP.Jumper, Bronze Mohawk, Gingham Typhoon, ISLANDDREAMS, Kryptonite Panda, Red Ladon, TA423, and Leviathan) and its capability to rapidly exploit disclosed flaws
The China-linked group was able to exploit vulnerabilities within hours or days of the public disclosure.
APT40 has previously targeted organizations in countries like Australia and the United States. The group is able to rapidly adapt vulnerability proofs of concept (POCs) for their operations. They identify new exploits in widely used public software, such as Log4J, Atlassian Confluence, and Microsoft Exchange, to target the associated infrastructure.
“APT 40 has previously targeted organizations in various countries, including Australia and the United States. Notably, APT 40 possesses the ability to quickly transform and adapt vulnerability proofs of concept (POCs) for targeting, reconnaissance, and exploitation operations.” reads the advisory. “APT 40 identifies new exploits within widely used public software such as Log4J, Atlassian Confluence and Microsoft Exchange to target the infrastructure of the associated vulnerability.“
In July 2021, the U.S. Justice Department (DoJ) indicted four members of the cyber espionage group APT40 (aka TEMP.Periscope, TEMP.Jumper, and Leviathan) for hacking tens of government organizations, private businesses and universities around the world between 2011 and 2018.
The APT40 group has been active since at least 2013, it is focused on targeting countries important to the country’s Belt and Road Initiative (i.e. Cambodia, Belgium, Germany, Hong Kong, Philippines, Malaysia, Norway, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland, the United States, and the United Kingdom).
The group appears to be focused on supporting the naval modernization efforts of the Government of Beijing. Threat actors target engineering, transportation, and defense sectors, experts observed a specific interest in maritime technologies.
The cyberspies also targeted research centres and universities involved in naval research with the intent to access advanced technology to push the growth of the Chinese naval industry. The list of victims of the APT40 group also includes organizations with operations in Southeast Asia or involved in South China Sea disputes.
Three of the defendants are said to be officers in a provincial arm of the MSS and one was an employee of a front company that was used to obfuscate the government’s role in the hacking campaigns.
“APT40 regularly conducts reconnaissance against networks of interest, including networks in the authoring agencies’ countries, looking for opportunities to compromise its targets. This regular reconnaissance postures the group to identify vulnerable, end-of-life or no longer maintained devices on networks of interest, and to rapidly deploy exploits. APT40 continues to find success exploiting vulnerabilities from as early as 2017.” continues the joint advisory. “APT40 rapidly exploits newly public vulnerabilities in widely used software such as Log4J (CVE-2021-44228), Atlassian Confluence (CVE-2021-31207, CVE-2021-26084) and Microsoft Exchange (CVE-2021-31207, CVE-2021-34523, CVE-2021-34473). ASD’s ACSC and the authoring agencies expect the group to continue using POCs for new high-profile vulnerabilities within hours or days of public release.”
APT40 use to exploit vulnerable public-facing infrastructure over other hacking techniques like phishing. They prioritize obtaining valid credentials for subsequent activities. The group often relies on web shells to maintain persistence early in an intrusion. Persistence is established early in an intrusion, making it likely to be observed in all cases, regardless of the level of compromise or further actions taken.
In the past, the APT40 was observed using compromised Australian websites as C2 servers, however he recently evolved this technique.
“APT40 has embraced the global trend of using compromised devices, including small-office/home-office (SOHO) devices, as operational infrastructure and last-hop redirectors [T1584.008] for its operations in Australia. This has enabled the authoring agencies to better characterize and track this group’s movements.” continues the report.
Many of the compromised SOHO devices are end-of-life or unpatched that can be easily hacked using N-day exploits. Compromised SOHO (Small Office/Home Office) devices provide attackers with a platform to launch attacks by mimicking legitimate traffic.
The report provides details about Tactics, Techniques, and Procesured associated by the the group and detection and mitigation recommendations.
Void Banshee APT group exploited the Windows zero-day CVE-2024-38112 to execute code via the disabled Internet Explorer.
An APT group tracked as Void Banshee was spotted exploiting the Windows zero-day CVE-2024-38112 (CVSS score of 7.5) to execute code through the disabled Internet Explorer.
The vulnerability is a Windows MSHTML Platform Spoofing Vulnerability. Successful exploitation of this vulnerability requires an attacker to take additional actions before exploitation to prepare the target environment. An attacker can trigger the issue by sending the victim a malicious file that the victim would have to execute.
Trend Micro researchers discovered that the flaw was actively exploited in the wild in May and reported it to Microsoft which addressed the zero-day with the July 2024 Patch Tuesday security updates.
Void Banshee was observed exploiting the CVE-2024-38112 flaw to drop the Atlantida info-stealer on the victims’ machines. The malware allows operators to gather system information and steal sensitive data, such as passwords and cookies, from multiple applications.
In the group’s attack chain, Void Banshee attempts to trick victims into opening zip archives containing malicious files disguised as book PDFs. The archives are disseminated in cloud-sharing websites, Discord servers, and online libraries, and other means. The APT group focuses on North America, Europe, and Southeast Asia.
“This zero-day attack is a prime example of how unsupported Windows relics are an overlooked attack surface that can still be exploited by threat actors to infect unsuspecting users with ransomware, backdoors, or as a conduit for other kinds of malware.” states Trend Micro.
Void Banshee exploited the disabled Internet Explorer process to run HTML Application (HTA) files using specially crafted .URL files with the MHTML protocol handler and the x-usc! directive. This technique resembles the exploitation of CVE-2021-40444, another MSHTML flaw that was exploited in zero-day attacks. The experts warn that this attack method is very concerning because Internet Explorer no longer receives updates or security fixes.
“In this attack, CVE-2024-38112 was used as a zero-day to redirect a victim by opening and using the system-disabled IE to a compromised website which hosted a malicious HTML Application (HTA)” states the report. “In the URL parameter of the internet shortcut file, we can see that Void Banshee specifically crafted this URL string using the MHTML protocol handler along with the x-usc! directive. This logic string opens the URL target in the native Internet Explorer through the iexplore.exe process.”
Attackers used the internet shortcut file to direct the victims to an attacker-controlled domain where an HTML file downloads the HTA stage of the infection chain. The researchers noticed that Void Banshee uses this HTML file to control the window view size of Internet Explorer, hiding browser information and hiding the download of the next infection stage from the victim.
By default, IE prompts users to open or save the HTML application, but the APT group disguised the HTA file as a PDF by adding spaces to the file extension. Upon running the HTA file, a series of scripts is executed, along with the LoadToBadXml .NET trojan loader, the Donut shellcode, and the Atlantida stealer.
“In this campaign, we have observed that even though users may no longer be able to access IE, threat actors can still exploit lingering Windows relics like IE on their machine to infect users and organizations with ransomware, backdoors, or as a proxy to execute other strains of malware.” Trend Micro concludes. “The ability of APT groups like Void Banshee to exploit disabled services such as IE poses a significant threat to organizations worldwide. Since services such as IE have a large attack surface and no longer receive patches, it represents a serious security concern to Windows users.”
China-linked APT group Daggerfly (aka Evasive Panda, Bronze Highland) Evasive Panda has been spotted using an updated version of the macOS backdoor Macma.
The China-linked APT group Daggerfly (aka Evasive Panda or Bronze Highland) has significantly updated its malware arsenal, adding a new malware family based on the MgBot framework and an updated Macma macOS backdoor.
“The Daggerfly (aka Evasive Panda, Bronze Highland) espionage group has extensively updated its toolset, introducing several new versions of its malware, most likely in response to exposure of older variants.” reads the report. “The new tooling was deployed in a number of recent attacks against organizations in Taiwan and a U.S. NGO based in China, which indicates the group also engages in internal espionage. In the attack on this organization, the attackers exploited a vulnerability in an Apache HTTP server to deliver their MgBot malware.“
The APT group was spotted using the malware families in attacks against Taiwanese organizations and a U.S. NGO in China. The attackers exploited an Apache HTTP server vulnerability to deliver their MgBot malware.
Daggerfly has been active for at least a decade, the group is known for the use of the custom MgBot malware framework. In 2023, Symantec identified a Daggerfly intrusion at an African telecom operator, using new MgBot plugins. This highlights the group’s ongoing evolution in cyber espionage tactics.
The Macma macOS backdoor was first detailed by Google in 2021 and has been used since at least 2019. At the time of discovery, threat actors employed the malware in watering hole attacks involving compromised websites in Hong Kong. The watering hole attacks used exploits for iOS and macOS devices. Attackers exploited the privilege escalation vulnerability CVE-2021-30869 to install Macma on macOS devices.
Macma is a modular backdoor that supports multiple functionalities, including device fingerprinting, executing commands, screen capture, keylogging, audio capture, uploading and downloading files.
Although Macma was widely used in cyber operations carried out by nation-state actors, it was not linked to a particular group. However, Symantec has found evidence to suggest that it is part of the Daggerfly toolkit. Two variants of the Macma backdoor C2 server (103.243.212[.]98) that was also used by an MgBot dropper.
In addition to this shared infrastructure, Macma and other malware in the Daggerfly’s arsenal, including Mgbot all contain code from a single, shared library or framework. Elements of this library have been used to build Windows, macOS, Linux, and Android threats. The functionality provided by this library includes:
Threading and synchronization primitives
Event notifications and timers
Data marshaling
Platform-independent abstractions (e.g. time)
The new variants used by Daggerfly implement the following additions/improvements:
New logic to collect a file’s system listing, with the new code based on Tree, a publicly available Linux/Unix utility.
Modified code in the AudioRecorderHelper feature
Additional parametrisation
Additional debug logging
Addition of a new file (param2.ini) to set options to adjust screenshot size and aspect ratio
The experts also observed another malware, tracked as Suzafk (aka ‘NetMM’, Nightdoor), in the group toolkit that ESET researchers linked to Evasive Panda in March.
“Suzafk is a multi-staged backdoor capable of using TCP or OneDrive for C&C. The malware contained the following configuration, indicating the functionality to connect to OneDrive is in development or present in other variants of the malware.” continues the report.
The backdoor includes the code from the al-khaser project, a public code repository developed to avoid detection by detecting virtual machines, sandboxes, and malware analysis environments.
The malware can also execute commands for network and system monitoring, such as ‘ipconfig,’ ‘systeminfo,’ ‘tasklist,’ and ‘netstat.’
“The [Daggerfly] group can create versions of its tools targeting most major operating system platforms.” concludes the report. “In addition to the tools documented here, Symantec has seen evidence of the ability to Trojanize Android APKs, SMS interception tools, DNS request interception tools, and even malware families targeting Solaris OS. Daggerfly appears to be capable of responding to exposure by quickly updating its toolset to continue its espionage activities with minimal disruption.”
Belarus-linked APT group GhostWriter targeted Ukrainian organizations with a malware family known as PicassoLoader, used to deliver various malicious payloads.
The Ukrainian Government’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-UA) reported a surge in activity associated with the APT group UAC-0057 (aka GhostWriter) group between July 12 and 18, 2024. Threat actors distributed documents containing macros designed to deploy the PICASSOLOADER malware on victim computers, which then delivered the post-exploitation tool Cobalt Strike Beacon.
The attackers used bait documents related to local government reform (USAID/DAI “HOVERLA” project), taxation, and financial-economic metrics (“oborona.rar,” “66_oborona_PURGED.xls,” “trix.xls,” “equipment_survey_regions_.xls,” “accounts.xls,” “spreadsheet.xls,” “attachment.xls,” “Податок_2024.xls”).
“Based on this, it can be inferred that UAC-0057 might have targeted both project office specialists and their counterparts among the employees of relevant local government bodies in Ukraine.” reads the report published by CERT-UA.
The campaign was likely part of a broader cyber espionage activity against the Ukrainian government.
In November 2021, Mandiant Threat Intelligence researchers linked the Ghostwriter disinformation campaign (aka UNC1151) to the government of Belarus.
In August 2020, security experts from FireEye uncovered a disinformation campaign aimed at discrediting NATO by spreading fake news content on compromised news websites.
According to FireEye, the campaign tracked as GhostWriter, has been ongoing since at least March 2017 and is aligned with Russian security interests.
Unlike other disinformation campaigns, GhostWriter doesn’t spread through social networks, instead, threat actors behind this campaign abused compromised content management systems (CMS) of news websites or spoofed email accounts to disseminate fake news.
The operators behind Ghostwriter targeted Belarusian entities before the 2020 elections, some of the individuals (representatives of the Belarusian opposition) targeted by the nation-state actor were later arrested by the Belarusian government.
China-linked group APT41 breached a Taiwanese government-affiliated research institute using ShadowPad and Cobalt Strike.
Cisco Talos researchers reported that the China-linked group compromised a Taiwanese government-affiliated research institute. The experts attributed the attack with medium confidence to the APT41 group.
The campaign started as early as July 2023 and threat actors delivered the ShadowPad malware, Cobalt Strike, and other post-exploitation tools.
The sample of ShadowPad malware employed in this campaign exploited an outdated vulnerable version of Microsoft Office IME binary as a loader. The loader in turn loads the customized second-stage loader for launching the payload.
“Cisco Talos assesses with medium confidence that this campaign is carried out by APT41, alleged by the U.S. government to be comprised of Chinese nationals. This assessment is based primarily on overlaps in tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs), infrastructure and malware families used exclusively by Chinese APT groups.” reads the report published by Cisco Talos. “Talos’ analyses of the malware loaders used in this attack reveal that these are ShadowPad loaders. However, Talos has been unable to retrieve the final ShadowPad payloads used by the attackers.”
ShadowPad is a modular remote access trojan (RAT) sold exclusively to Chinese hacking groups. It has been publicly linked to APT41, a group believed to operate from Chengdu, China, and has also been used by other Chinese groups such as Mustang Panda and the Tonto Team.
The researchers were not able to determine the initial attack vector. The attackers compromised three hosts in the targeted environment and exfiltrated some documents from the network.
Attackers used a web shell to maintain persistence and drop additional payloads like ShadowPad and Cobalt Strike.
The attackers used a unique Cobalt Strike loader written in GoLang to bypass Windows Defender’s detection. This loader, derived from an anti-AV tool called CS-Avoid-Killing found on GitHub and written in Simplified Chinese, is promoted in various Chinese hacking forums and tutorials. The presence of Simplified Chinese file and directory paths suggests that the threat actors who created the loader are proficient in the language.
Attackers were also observed running PowerShell commands to execute scripts used to run the ShadowPad malware directly in memory and fetch Cobalt Strike malware from C2 server.
“During our investigation of this campaign, we encountered two distinct iterations of ShadowPad. While both iterations utilized the same sideloading technique, they each exploited different vulnerable legitimate binaries to initiate the ShadowPad loader.” continues the report. “The initial variant of the ShadowPad loader had been previously discussed in 2020, and some vendors had referred to it as ‘ScatterBee’. Its technical structure and the names of its multiple components have remained consistent with earlier reports. The more recent variant of the ShadowPad loader targeted an outdated and susceptible version of the Microsoft Office IME imecmnt.exe binary, which is over 13 years old.”
Talos also discovered that APT41 created a custom loader to inject a proof-of-concept for CVE-2018-0824 directly into memory. The threat actors used a remote code execution vulnerability to achieve local privilege escalation.
“During the compromise the threat actor attempts to exploit CVE-2018-0824, with a tool called UnmarshalPwn, which we will detail in the sections below.” continues the report. “The malicious actor is careful, in an attempt to avoid detection, during its activity executes “quser” which, when using RDP allows it to see who else is logged on the system. Hence the actor can stop its activity if any other use is on the system. Cisco Talos also noticed that once the backdoors are deployed the malicious actor will delete the webshell and guest account that allowed the initial access.”
By analyzing artifacts from this campaign, the researchers identified samples and infrastructure potentially used by the same threat actors in different campaigns. Sharing these findings could help the community to make connections and enhance further investigations.
Talos released Indicators of Compromise for this campaign on their GitHub repository.
South Korea’s National Cyber Security Center (NCSC) reported that North Korea-linked hackers hijacked VPN software updates to deploy malware.
South Korea’s national security and intelligence agencies, including the National Intelligence Service, the Prosecutor’s Office, the Police Agency, the Military Intelligence Command, and the Cyber Operations Command, have issued a joint cybersecurity advisory to warn that North Korea-linked hackers exploited VPN software update to install malware on target networks.
According to the South Korean authorities, the government of Pyongyang’s goal is to steal intellectual property and trade secrets from the South.
North Korea-linked actors hacking groups are targeting South Korea’s construction and machinery industries. The advisory provides details on the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) employed by the attackers, as well as indicators of compromise (IoCs) for these attacks.
“Following the official announcement of the “Local Development 20×10 Policy” by Kim Jong-un at the 14th Supreme People’s Assembly on January 15 this year, North Korea has been pushing for the construction of modern industrial plants in 20 cities and counties annually. North Korean hacking organizations are also intensifying their efforts to support this policy.” reads the advisory. “It is suspected that North Korean hackers are stealing data from South Korea’s construction, machinery, and urban development sectors to support their industrial plant construction and local development plans.”
The North Korean APT groups Kimsuky and Andariel, both linked to the Reconnaissance General Bureau, are the main hacking groups involved. Their simultaneous and targeted attacks on specific sectors are considered unusual and experts highlighted that they necessitate careful preparation.
In January 2024, the Kimsuky APT group was spotted distributing malware through the website of a construction industry association in South Korea. The malware was concealed within security authentication software used during website login. The attack aimed at infecting PCs belonging to personnel from local governments, public institutions, and construction companies who accessed the site. This attack combined a “supply chain attack,” which involved tampering with legitimate distribution channels, with a “watering hole attack,” targeting websites frequently visited by construction and design professionals.
“When the tampered security authentication software installation file is executed, malware in the form of a DLL is run in the %APPDATA% directory, along with legitimate programs. This malware operates in the background to steal information, making it difficult for users to notice malicious activities. The malware, written in Go, is identified by some security firms as ‘TrollAgent’.” reads the advisory. “The malware has functionalities to collect system information, capture user screens, and gather information stored in browsers (credentials, cookies, bookmarks, history). It can also steal GPKI certificates, SSH keys, Sticky Notes, and FileZilla information from the infected PC.”
Another case detailed by the researchers took place in April 2024, when the Andariel hacking group exploited vulnerabilities in domestic VPN and server security software to distribute remote control malware, DoraRAT, to construction and machinery companies. The attackers manipulated the VPN client-server communication protocol to disguise malicious update files as legitimate ones. The compromised VPN client mistakenly accepted these files, leading to the execution of DoraRAT.
“The remote control malware (DoraRAT) used in the attack was simple and lightweight, focusing on basic functions like file upload/download and command execution. It was distributed using a watering hole technique, which increased its exposure. Unlike more sophisticated APT malware, DoraRAT had minimal functionality. Additionally, a file-stealing variant was identified, capable of exfiltrating large files related to machinery and equipment design.” continues the joint advisory. “Andariel also exploited vulnerabilities in server security products, demonstrating a trend of targeting IT management software for mass infections due to their high-level access and control.”
Below are the mitigations provided by North Korean authorities:
Organizations managing websites in sectors like construction and machinery should seek security assessments from relevant institutions if needed.
Ongoing security training for all organizational members, including IT and security staff, is crucial.
Keep operating systems and applications up-to-date, and use updated antivirus software with real-time detection.
Implement strict approval policies for software distribution to prevent vulnerabilities in automated deployment.
Stay informed about government cybersecurity advisories and act promptly on manufacturer recommendations.
Refer to guidelines for software supply chain security and software development security provided by national authorities.
A China-linked APT, tracked as StormBamboo, compromised an internet service provider (ISP) to poison software update mechanisms with malware.
Volexity researchers reported that a China-linked APT group, tracked as StormBamboo (aka Evasive Panda, Daggerfly, and StormCloud), successfully compromised an undisclosed internet service provider (ISP) in order to poison DNS responses for target organizations.
The threat actors targeted insecure software update mechanisms to install malware on macOS and Windows victim machines.
In mid-2023, Volexity discovered multiple malware infections affecting macOS and Windows systems within victim organizations. The company linked the attacks to StormBamboo APT group. Upon investigating the incidents, the researchers determined that a DNS poisoning attack at the ISP level caused the infection. The attackers altered DNS responses for domains related to software updates to deploy multiple malware families, including MACMA and POCOSTICK (MGBot). The attacker’s methods resemble those of DriftingBamboo, suggesting a possible connection between the two threat actors.
Daggerfly has been active for at least a decade, the group is known for the use of the custom MgBot malware framework. In 2023, Symantec identified a Daggerfly intrusion at an African telecom operator, using new MgBot plugins. This highlights the group’s ongoing evolution in cyber espionage tactics.
The Macma macOS backdoor was first detailed by Google in 2021 and has been used since at least 2019. At the time of discovery, threat actors employed the malware in watering hole attacks involving compromised websites in Hong Kong. The watering hole attacks used exploits for iOS and macOS devices. Attackers exploited the privilege escalation vulnerability CVE-2021-30869 to install Macma on macOS devices.
Macma is a modular backdoor that supports multiple functionalities, including device fingerprinting, executing commands, screen capture, keylogging, audio capture, uploading and downloading files.
Although Macma was widely used in cyber operations carried out by nation-state actors, it was not linked to a particular group.
“During one incident investigated by Volexity, it was discovered that StormBamboo poisoned DNS requests to deploy malware via an HTTP automatic update mechanism and poison responses for legitimate hostnames that were used as second-stage, command-and-control (C2) servers.” reads the report published by Volexity. “The DNS records were poisoned to resolve to an attacker-controlled server in Hong Kong at IP address 103.96.130[.]107. Initially, Volexity suspected the initial victim organization’s firewall may have been compromised. However, further investigation revealed the DNS poisoning was not performed within the target infrastructure, but further upstream at the ISP level.”
Volexity promptly alerted the ISP, which then investigated key traffic-routing devices on their network. After rebooting and taking parts of the network offline, the DNS poisoning stopped. The researchers were not able to identify a specific compromised device, however updating or deactivating various infrastructure components effectively ended the malicious activity.
“The logic behind the abuse of automatic updates is the same for all the applications: the legitimate application performs an HTTP request to retrieve a text-based file (the format varies) containing the latest application version and a link to the installer.” continues the report. “Since the attacker has control of the DNS responses for any given DNS name, they abuse this design, redirecting the HTTP request to a C2 server they control hosting a forged text file and a malicious installer. The AiTM workflow is shown below.”
StormBamboo targeted various software vendors with insecure update mechanisms, using complex methods to deploy malware. For example, they targeted 5KPlayer’s update process for the “youtube-dl” dependency to deliver a backdoored installer from their C2 servers. Once compromised systems, the attackers installed a malicious Google Chrome extension called ReloadText to steal browser cookies and email data.
“The incident described in this blog post confirms the supposition made by ESET concerning the infection vector for the POCOSTICK malware. The attacker can intercept DNS requests and poison them with malicious IP addresses, and then use this technique to abuse automatic update mechanisms that use HTTP rather than HTTPS.” concludes the report. “This method is similar to the attack vector Volexity previously observed being used by DriftingBamboo following the 0-day exploitation of Sophos Firewalls.”
Cybersecurity analysts have uncovered critical details about the North Korean advanced persistent threat (APT) group Kimsuky, which has been targeting universities as part of its global espionage operations.
Kimsuky, active since at least 2012, primarily targets South Korean think tanks and government entities, though its reach extends to the US, the UK and other European nations. The group specializes in sophisticated phishing campaigns, often posing as academics or journalists to infiltrate networks and steal sensitive information.
Recent Findings and Tactics
According to a new advisory published by Resilience today, its analysts capitalized on Kimsuky’s operational security mistakes, which led to the collection of source code, login credentials and other crucial data.
The data revealed that Kimsuky has been phishing university staff, researchers and professors, aiming to access and exfiltrate valuable research and intelligence. Once inside university networks, the group was observed stealing information critical for North Korea, particularly given the country’s limited scientific community.
The group’s actions align with the objectives of the Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB), North Korea’s primary foreign intelligence agency.
Historically, Kimsuky has been linked to attempts to steal sensitive data, including nuclear research, healthcare innovations and pharmaceutical secrets. There is also evidence suggesting that Kimsuky engages in financially motivated cybercrime, potentially as a means to fund its espionage activities.
Resilience’s new findings shed light on Kimsuky’s methods, particularly its use of phishing pages that mimic legitimate university login portals. By altering the code of these pages, Kimsuky can capture the credentials of unsuspecting victims. Notably, the group has targeted institutions such as Dongduk University, Korea University and Yonsei University.
The operation also highlighted Kimsuky’s use of a custom tool called “SendMail,” which was deployed to send phishing emails using compromised email accounts. These emails were carefully crafted to deceive recipients into providing their login information, furthering Kimsuky’s espionage efforts.
According to Resilience, the breadth and depth of Kimsuky’s tactics underscore the persistent and evolving threat posed by state-backed cyber groups.
Recommendations for Organizations
To tackle this threat, the security firm recommended leveraging phish-resistant multifactor authentication (MFA), such as FIDO-compliant hardware tokens or push-based mobile applications.
Additionally, users should always double-check that the URL they are logging into matches the page they expect to be on, as some password managers can assist with this automatically.
Finally, organizations are encouraged to review and test Breach and Attack Simulation packages that simulate Kimsuky activity to better prepare for potential attacks.
A new self-spreading worm named ‘CMoon,’ capable of stealing account credentials and other data, has been distributed in Russia since early July 2024 via a compromised gas supply company website.
According to Kaspersky researchers who discovered the campaign, CMoon can perform a broad range of functions, including loading additional payloads, snapping screenshots, and launching distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.
Judging from the distribution channel the threat actors used, their targeting scope is focused on high-value targets rather than random internet users, which indicates a sophisticated operation.
Distribution mechanism
Kaspersky says the infection chain begins when users click on links to regulatory documents (docx, .xlsx, .rtf, and .pdf) found on various pages of a company’s website that provides gasification and gas supply services to a Russian city.
The threat actors replaced the document links with links to malicious executables, which were also hosted on the site and delivered to the victims as self-extracting archives containing the original document and the CMoon payload, named after the original link.
“We have not seen other vectors of distribution of this malware, so we believe that the attack is aimed only at visitors to the particular site,” reports Kaspersky.
After the gas firm was notified of this compromise, the malicious files and links were removed from its website on July 25, 2024.
However, due to CMoon’s self-propagation mechanisms, its distribution may continue autonomously.
CMoon is a .NET worm that copies itself to a newly created folder named after the antivirus software it detected on the compromised device or one resembling a system folder if no AVs are detected.
The worm creates a shortcut on the Windows Startup directory to ensure it runs on system startup, securing persistence between reboots.
To avoid raising suspicions during manual user checks, it alters its files’ creation and modification dates to May 22, 2013.
The worm monitors for newly connected USB drives, and when any are hooked up on the infected machine, it replaces all files except for ‘LNKs’ and ‘EXEs’ with shortcuts to its executable.
CMoon also looks for interesting files stored on the USB drives and temporarily stores them in hidden directories (‘.intelligence’ and ‘.usb’) before these are exfiltrated to the attacker’s server.
CMoon features standard info-stealer functionality, targeting cryptocurrency wallets, data stored in web browsers, messenger apps, FTP and SSH clients, and document files in the USB or user folders that contain the text strings ‘secret,’ ‘service,’ or ‘password.’
An interesting and somewhat unusual feature is the targeting of files that might contain account credentials such as .pfx, .p12, .kdb, .kdbx, .lastpass, .psafe3, .pem, .key, .private, .asc, .gpg, .ovpn, and .log files.
Targeted directories and data Source: Kaspersky
The malware can also download and execute additional payloads, capture screenshots of the breached device, and initiate DDoS attacks on specified targets.
Stolen files and system information are packaged and sent to an external server, where they are decrypted (RC4) and verified for their integrity using an MD5 hash.
Generating the data package for exfiltration Source: Kaspersky
Kaspersky leaves open the possibility of more sites outside its current visibility distributing CMoon, so vigilance is advised.
No matter how targeted this campaign may be, the fact that the worm spreads autonomously means it could reach unintended systems and create the conditions for opportunistic attacks.
CISA and the FBI confirmed today that the Royal ransomware rebranded to BlackSuit and has demanded over $500 million from victims since it emerged more than two years ago.
This new information was shared as an update to a joint advisory published in March 2023, which says the BlackSuit gang has been active since September 2022.
However, this private group is believed to be a direct successor of the notorious Conti cybercrime syndicate and started as Quantum ransomware in January 2022.
While they initially used other gangs’ encryptors (like ALPHV/BlackCat), likely to avoid drawing unwanted attention, they deployed their own Zeon encryptor soon after and rebranded to Royal in September 2022.
After attacking the City of Dallas, Texas, in June 2023, the Royal ransomware operation began testing a new encryptor called BlackSuit amid rebranding rumors. Since then, they have been operating under the BlackSuit name, and Royal Ransomware attacks have stopped altogether.
“BlackSuit ransomware is the evolution of the ransomware previously identified as Royal ransomware, which was used from approximately September 2022 through June 2023. BlackSuit shares numerous coding similarities with Royal ransomware and has exhibited improved capabilities,” the FBI and CISA confirmed in a Wednesday update to their original advisory.
“Ransom demands have typically ranged from approximately $1 million to $10 million USD, with payment demanded in Bitcoin. BlackSuit actors have demanded over $500 million USD in total and the largest individual ransom demand was $60 million.”
In March 2023 and a subsequent November 2023 advisory update, the two agencies shared indicators of compromise and a list of tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) to help defenders block the gang’s attempts to deploy ransomware on their networks.
CISA and the FBI also linked the BlackSuit gang to attacks against over 350 organizations since September 2022 and at least $275 million in ransom demands.
The joint advisory was first issued after the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) security team revealed in December 2022 that the ransomware operation was behind multiple attacks targeting healthcare organizations across the United States.
Most recently, multiple sources told BleepingComputer that the BlackSuit ransomware gang was behind a massive CDK Global IT outage that disrupted operations at over 15,000 car dealerships across North America.
This widespread outage after last month’s attack forced CDK to shut down its IT systems and data centers to contain the incident and car dealerships to switch to pen and paper, making it impossible for buyers to purchase cars or receive service for already-bought vehicles.
On Tuesday, IT and phone systems at McLaren Health Care hospitals were disrupted following an attack linked to the INC Ransom ransomware operation.
McLaren is a non-profit healthcare system with annual revenues of over $6.5 billion, which operates a network of 13 hospitals across Michigan supported by a team of 640 physicians. It also has over 28,000 employees and works with 113,000 network providers throughout Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio.
“While McLaren Health Care continues to investigate a disruption to our information technology system, we want to ensure our teams are as prepared as possible to care for patients when they arrive,” a statement on the health system’s website reads.
“Patients with scheduled appointments should plan to attend those appointments unless they are contacted by a member of our care team.
McLaren hinted the hospitals had lost access to patient information databases when advising patients to bring detailed information about their current medications to appointments, including physician orders and printed results of recent lab tests. The health system also said it may have to reschedule some appointments and non-emergent or elective procedures “out of an abundance of caution.”
“We understand this situation may be frustrating to our patients – and to our team members – and we deeply and sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may cause,” McLaren added. “We kindly ask for your patience while our caregivers and support teams work as diligently as ever to provide our communities the care they need and deserve.”
Even though McLaren has yet to disclose the nature of the incident, employees at McLaren Bay Region Hospital in Bay City have shared a ransom note warning that the hospital’s systems have been encrypted and stolen data will be published on INC RANSOM ransomware gang’s leak site if a ransom is not paid.
INC Ransom is a ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) operation that surfaced in July 2023 and has since targeted organizations in both the public and private sectors.
In May, a threat actor known as “salfetka” claimed to be selling source code of INC Ransom’s Windows and Linux/ESXi encrypter versions for $300,000 on the Exploit and XSS hacking forums.
Two months later, in July, malware analysts stated that the source code might have been purchased by a newly emerged ransomware group called Lynx ransomware. However, this could also be a rebranding effort, potentially allowing INC RANSOM to continue operations with less scrutiny from law enforcement.
BleepingComputer did an analysis of strings between the new Lynx ransomware encryptors and recent INC encryptors, and other than small changes, can confirm they are mostly the same.
INC vs. Lynx ransomware string comparison (BleepingComputer)
In November 2023, McLaren notified almost 2.2 million people of a data breach that exposed their personal and health information between late July and August 2023.
Compromised data included names, Social Security numbers, health insurance and physician information, as well as Medicare/Medicaid, prescription/medication, and diagnostic results and treatment information.
The ALPHV/BlackCat ransomware group claimed the July 2023 attack behind the data breach on October 4.
Threat actors are actively attempting to exploit a recently fixed Progress WhatsUp Gold remote code execution vulnerability on exposed servers for initial access to corporate networks.
The vulnerability leveraged in these attacks is CVE-2024-4885, a critical-severity (CVSS v3 score: 9.8) unauthenticated remote code execution flaw impacting Progress WhatsUp Gold 23.1.2 and older.
Proof-of-concept (PoC) exploits for CVE-2024-4885 are publicly available that target exposed WhatsUp Gold ‘/NmAPI/RecurringReport’ endpoints.
Threat monitoring organization Shadowserver Foundation reports that the attempts started on August 1, 2024, coming from six distinct IP addresses.
The CVE-2024-4885 RCE
Progress WhatsUp Gold is a network monitoring application that allows you to track the uptime and availability of servers and services running on them. However, as with any software, it should only be accessible internally, through a VPN, or via trusted IP addresses.
On June 25, 2024, Progress released a security bulletin warning about fifteen high and critical-severity bugs, including CVE-2024-4885, a 9.8-rated critical RCE flaw. Progress urged users to upgrade to the latest version, 23.1.3, to resolve the vulnerabilities.
CVE-2024-4885 is a remote code execution flaw in the ‘WhatsUp.ExportUtilities.Export. GetFileWithoutZip’ function, allowing unauthenticated attackers to execute commands with the privileges of the ‘iisapppool\\nmconsole’ user.
This is not an admin user but still has elevated permissions within the context of WhatsUp Gold. It can execute code on the server and even access the underlying system.
The vendor’s recommendations for those unable to upgrade to 23.1.3 were to monitor exploitation attempts at the’/NmAPI/RecurringReport’ endpoint and implement firewall rules to restrict access to it only to trusted IP addresses on ports 9642 and 9643.
The exploit sends a ‘TestRecurringReport’ request to an exposed WhatsUp Gold reporting endpoint that contains a specially crafted configuration. This configuration includes the URL to an attacker-controlled web server and the user ID the targeted server should respond with.
When the targeted server responds to the attacker’s server, it will include the user name and encrypted password associated with the user ID.
Kheirkhah’s exploit uses this information to make and receive further requests and resposnes with the targeted server to ultimately cause a file to be written on the server, which is then launched remotely for code execution, as illustrated below.
As the final payload in the exploit is delivered from attacker-controlled servers, it is unknown at this time what payloads are being created on targeted servers. However, similar activity in the past created webshells on the targeted devices for easier access and persistence.
Given the active exploitation status, WhatsUp Gold admins should apply the latest security updates or mitigations and continue monitoring for suspicious activity.
The WhatsUp Gold server should also be placed behind a firewall and accessible only internally or by trusted IP addresses.
A global stop-payment mechanism created by INTERPOL successfully recovered over $40 million stolen in a BEC attack on a company in Singapore.
INTERPOL says this is the largest recovery of funds stolen through a business email compromise (BEC) scam.
BEC scams are a type of cyberattack in which cybercriminals attempt to redirect legitimate corporate payments to an attacker-controlled bank account.
These attacks are conducted by threat actors compromising a vendor’s or company’s email address to trick billing departments into approving new banking information where payment should be sent. When the threat actors receive the payment, they quickly use money mules to drain the account or transfer it to numerous other accounts under their control.
The 2023 FBI IC3 Report says that they received 21,489 complaints with $2.9 billion in reported losses due to business email compromise in 2023.
I-GRIP recovers over $40 million
According to an announcement by INTERPOL, a commodity firm based in Singapore fell victim to a BEC attack after receiving what they thought was an email from their supplier.
“On 15 July, the firm had received an email from a supplier requesting that a pending payment be sent to a new bank account based in Timor Leste,” reads the announcement.
“The email, however, came from a fraudulent account spelled slightly different to the supplier’s official email address.”
Thinking this was a legitimate request, the firm wired $42.3 million to the attacker-controlled bank accounts, only to realize four days later that they had fallen for an attack.
After reporting the attack to the Singapore authorities, law enforcement used INTERPOL’s Global Rapid Intervention of Payments (I-GRIP) to request assistance from authorities in Timor Leste and recover $39 million from the BEC attack.
Further investigations by the Timor Leste authorities led to the arrest of seven suspects and the recovery of an additional $2 million, bringing the total recovered amount to $41 million.
In June, a global police operation called “Operation First Light” arrested 3,950 people for their suspected involvement in phishing, pig butchering scams, fake online shopping sites, and romance and impersonation scams.
I-GRIP was also used during the operation to recover millions of dollars stolen by the threat actors. Since its launch in 2022, it has been used to recover over $500 million stolen through fraud and cybercrime.
SafeBreach security researcher Alon Leviev revealed at Black Hat 2024 that two zero-days could be exploited in downgrade attacks to “unpatch” fully updated Windows 10, Windows 11, and Windows Server systems and reintroduce old vulnerabilities.
Microsoft issued advisories on the two unpatched zero-days (tracked as CVE-2024-38202 and CVE-2024-21302) in coordination with the Black Hat talk, providing mitigation advice until a fix is released.
In downgrade attacks, threat actors force an up-to-date target device to roll back to older software versions, reintroducing vulnerabilities that can be exploited to compromise the systems.
SafeBreach security researcher Alon Leviev discovered that the Windows update process could be compromised to downgrade critical OS components, including dynamic link libraries (DLLs) and the NT Kernel. Even though all of these components were now out of date, when checking with Windows Update, the OS reported that it was fully updated, with recovery and scanning tools unable to detect any issues.
By exploiting the zero-day vulnerabilities, he could also downgrade Credential Guard’s Secure Kernel and Isolated User Mode Process and Hyper-V’s hypervisor to expose past privilege escalation vulnerabilities.
“I discovered multiple ways to disable Windows virtualization-based security (VBS), including its features such as Credential Guard and Hypervisor-Protected Code integrity (HVCI), even when enforced with UEFI locks. To my knowledge, this is the first time VBS’s UEFI locks have been bypassed without physical access,” Leviev revealed.
“As a result, I was able to make a fully patched Windows machine susceptible to thousands of past vulnerabilities, turning fixed vulnerabilities into zero-days and making the term “fully patched” meaningless on any Windows machine in the world.”
As Leviev said, this downgrade attack is undetectable because it cannot be blocked by endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions, and it’s also invisible since Windows Update reports that a device is fully updated (despite being downgraded).
Microsoft said today that it’s still working on a fix for the Windows Update Stack Elevation of Privilege (CVE-2024-38202) and Windows Secure Kernel Mode Elevation of Privilege (CVE-2024-21302) vulnerabilities used by Leviev to elevate privileges, create malicious updates, and reintroduce security flaws by replacing Windows system files with older versions.
As the company explains, the CVE-2024-38202 Windows Backup privilege escalation vulnerability enables attackers with basic user privileges to “unpatch” previously mitigated security bugs or bypass Virtualization Based Security (VBS) features. Attackers with admin privileges can exploit the CVE-2024-21302 privilege escalation flaw to replace Windows system files with outdated and vulnerable versions.
Microsoft said it’s not currently aware of any attempts to exploit this vulnerability in the wild and advised implementing recommendations shared in two security advisories published today to help reduce the risk of exploitation until a security update is released.
“I was able to show how it was possible to make a fully patched Windows machine susceptible to thousands of past vulnerabilities, turning fixed vulnerabilities into zero-days and making the term ‘fully patched’ meaningless on any Windows machine in the world,” Leviev said.
“We believe the implications are significant not only to Microsoft Windows, which is the world’s most widely used desktop OS, but also to other OS vendors that may potentially be susceptible to downgrade attacks.”
Update August 07, 17:27 EDT: A Microsoft spokesperson sent the following statement after the story was published.
We appreciate the work of SafeBreach in identifying and responsibly reporting this vulnerability through a coordinated vulnerability disclosure. We are actively developing mitigations to protect against these risks while following an extensive process involving a thorough investigation, update development across all affected versions, and compatibility testing, to ensure maximized customer protection with minimized operational disruption.
Microsoft also told BleepingComputer that they are working on an update that will revoke outdated, unpatched Virtualization Based Security (VBS) system files to mitigate the attack. However, it will take time to test this update due to the large number of files that will be impacted.
Cybersecurity researchers have uncovered security shortcomings in SAP AI Core cloud-based platform for creating and deploying predictive artificial intelligence (AI) workflows that could be exploited to get hold of access tokens and customer data.
The five vulnerabilities have been collectively dubbed SAPwned by cloud security firm Wiz.
“The vulnerabilities we found could have allowed attackers to access customers’ data and contaminate internal artifacts – spreading to related services and other customers’ environments,” security researcher Hillai Ben-Sasson said in a report shared with The Hacker News.
Following responsible disclosure on January 25, 2024, the weaknesses were addressed by SAP as of May 15, 2024.
In a nutshell, the flaws make it possible to obtain unauthorized access to customers’ private artifacts and credentials to cloud environments like Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, and SAP HANA Cloud.
They could also be used to modify Docker images on SAP’s internal container registry, SAP’s Docker images on the Google Container Registry, and artifacts hosted on SAP’s internal Artifactory server, resulting in a supply chain attack on SAP AI Core services.
Furthermore, the access could be weaponized to gain cluster administrator privileges on SAP AI Core’s Kubernetes cluster by taking advantage of the fact that the Helm package manager server was exposed to both read and write operations.
“Using this access level, an attacker could directly access other customer’s Pods and steal sensitive data, such as models, datasets, and code,” Ben-Sasson explained. “This access also allows attackers to interfere with customer’s Pods, taint AI data and manipulate models’ inference.”
Wiz said the issues arise due to the platform making it feasible to run malicious AI models and training procedures without adequate isolation and sandboxing mechanisms.
“The recent security flaws in AI service providers like Hugging Face, Replicate, and SAP AI Core highlight significant vulnerabilities in their tenant isolation and segmentation implementations,” Ben-Sasson told The Hacker News. “These platforms allow users to run untrusted AI models and training procedures in shared environments, increasing the risk of malicious users being able to access other users’ data.”
“Unlike veteran cloud providers who have vast experience with tenant-isolation practices and use robust isolation techniques like virtual machines, these newer services often lack this knowledge and rely on containerization, which offers weaker security. This underscores the need to raise awareness of the importance of tenant isolation and to push the AI service industry to harden their environments.”
As a result, a threat actor could create a regular AI application on SAP AI Core, bypass network restrictions, and probe the Kubernetes Pod’s internal network to obtain AWS tokens and access customer code and training datasets by exploiting misconfigurations in AWS Elastic File System (EFS) shares.
“People should be aware that AI models are essentially code. When running AI models on your own infrastructure, you could be exposed to potential supply chain attacks,” Ben-Sasson said.
“Only run trusted models from trusted sources, and properly separate between external models and sensitive infrastructure. When using AI services providers, it’s important to verify their tenant-isolation architecture and ensure they apply best practices.”
The findings come as Netskope revealed that the growing enterprise use of generative AI has prompted organizations to use blocking controls, data loss prevention (DLP) tools, real-time coaching, and other mechanisms to mitigate risk.
“Regulated data (data that organizations have a legal duty to protect) makes up more than a third of the sensitive data being shared with generative AI (genAI) applications — presenting a potential risk to businesses of costly data breaches,” the company said.
They also follow the emergence of a new cybercriminal threat group called NullBulge that has trained its sights on AI- and gaming-focused entities since April 2024 with an aim to steal sensitive data and sell compromised OpenAI API keys in underground forums while claiming to be a hacktivist crew “protecting artists around the world” against AI.
“NullBulge targets the software supply chain by weaponizing code in publicly available repositories on GitHub and Hugging Face, leading victims to import malicious libraries, or through mod packs used by gaming and modeling software,” SentinelOne security researcher Jim Walter said.
“The group uses tools like AsyncRAT and XWorm before delivering LockBit payloads built using the leaked LockBit Black builder. Groups like NullBulge represent the ongoing threat of low-barrier-of-entry ransomware, combined with the evergreen effect of info-stealer infections.”
The Secure Shell (SSH) isn’t just about allowing you to remote into servers to tackle admin tasks. Thanks to this secure networking protocol, you can also mount remote directories with the help of the SSH File System (SSHF).
SSHFS uses SFTP (SSH File Transfer Protocol) to mount remote directories to a local machine using secure encryption, which means the connection is far more secure than your standard FTP. As well, once a remote directory is mounted, it can be used as if it was on the local machine.
Consider SSHFS to be a more secure way of creating network shares, the only difference is you have to have SSHFS installed on any machine that needs to connect to the share (whereas with Samba, you only have to have it installed on the machine hosting the share).
Let’s walk through the process of getting SSHFS up and running, so you can securely mount remote directories to your local machine.
What You’ll Need
To make this work, you’ll need at least two Linux machines. These machines can be Ubuntu or Fedora-based, because SSHFS is found in the standard repositories for most Linux distributions. You’ll also need a user with sudo privileges.
Installing SSHFS
Since SSHFS is found in the standard repositories, the installation is quite simple. Log into the server (which will house the directory to share) and install SSHFS with one of the following commands:
openSUSE-based distributions – sudo zypper -n in sshfs
Next, log into your local machine and install the package as well.
Once installed, you’ll need to set user_allow_other in the SSHFS config file on the local machine. For that, open the file with:
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sudo nano /etc/fuse.conf
In that file, locate the line:
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#user_allow_other
Change that to:
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user_allow_other
Save and close the file.
Creating a Directory for Mounting
Back on the server, we must create a directory that will be mounted on the client machines. We’ll place our new directory in /srv with the command:
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sudo mkdir /srv/data
With the new directory created, we need to give it ownership, such that either a user or group can access it. If you only have one user who needs to access it, you can change the ownership with the command:
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sudo chown -R USERNAME:USERNAME /srv/data
If you want to allow more than one user to access the directory, you’d need to first create a group with the command:
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sudo groupadd GROUP
Where GROUP is the name of the new group.
Next, add the necessary users to the group (one at a time) with the command:
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sudo usermod -aG GROUP USERNAME
Where GROUP is the name of the group and USERNAME is the name of the user to be added.
You would then need to change the ownership of the new directory to the new group with:
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sudo chown -R USERNAME:GROUP /srv/data
On the local machine, you’ll have to create a directory that will house the mounted remote directory. We’ll create this in a user’s home directory with:
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mkdir ~/data_mount
Mount the Directory
It’s now time to mount our remote directory. Remember, we’re mounting the remote directory /srv/data to the local directory ~/data_mount. This is done with the command:
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sshfs USER@SERVER:/srv/data ~/data_mount
Where USER is the remote username and SERVER is the IP address of the remote server. You’ll be prompted for the remote user’s password. On successful authentication, the remote directory will be mounted to the local directory and you can access it as if it were native to the local machine. If you save or edit a file in ~/data_mount, it will be reflected in /srv/data on the remote machine.
This method of mounting is temporary. Let’s make it permanent.
Permanently Mount the Remote Drive
To permanently mount the SSHFS drive, you have to jump through a few hoops before it’ll work. First, you must create an SSH key pair (on the local machine) with the command:
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ssh-keygen -t rsa
Make sure to give the key a strong/unique password.
Once the key is generated, copy it to the server with the command:
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ssh-copy-id USER@SERVER
Where USER is the remote user name and SERVER is the IP address of the remote server.
Let’s test the connection to ensure it’s working properly. From the local machine, SSH to the server with:
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ssh USER@SERVER
Where USER is the remote username and SERVER is the IP address of the remote server. You should be prompted for the SSH key password and not your user password. Once you’ve successfully authenticated, exit from the connection with the exit command.
To make this mount permanent, you need to modify the /etc/fstab file on the local machine. Open that file for editing with:
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sudo nano /etc/fstab
At the bottom of the file, paste the following line:
Where USER1 is the remote username, SERVER is the IP address of the server, USER2 is the username on the local machine, and USER_ID and GROUP_ID are unique to the local machine. You can locate the IDs with the command:
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id
You should see entries like this:
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uid=1000(jack) gid=1000(jack)
In the above example, the user ID is 1000 and the group ID is also 1000.
Save the file and test the mount with:
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mount -a
If you receive no errors, all is well.
There is one caveat to this. During the boot process, the mount will fail because it will be attempted before networking is brought up. Because of this, after a reboot on the local machine, you’ll have to open a terminal window and mount the SSHFS directory with the command:
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mount -a
Once you’ve done that, you’re ready to use the remote directory as if it were local.
Microsoft’s response to a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack appears to have caused Azure service outages that impacted many customers.
Microsoft explained on its Azure status page that a “subset of customers” experienced issues connecting to services such as Azure App Services, Application Insights, Azure IoT Central, Azure Log Search Alerts, and Azure Policy, as well as the Azure portal and some Microsoft 365 and Purview services.
According to the BBC, the outage, which lasted roughly 10 hours, impacted water utilities, courts, banks, and other types of organizations.
Microsoft said it initially saw an unexpected usage spike that resulted in Azure Front Door and Azure Content Delivery Network components “performing below acceptable thresholds”, which led to errors, timeouts and latency issues.
An investigation showed that a DDoS attack launched against its systems triggered protection mechanisms, but an implementation bug in those defenses caused the attack’s impact to be amplified rather than mitigated.
The tech giant has promised to publish a preliminary incident review within 72 hours and a more detailed review within two weeks.
It’s unclear who is behind the DDoS attack on Microsoft services, but it would not be surprising if multiple hacktivist groups take credit for it in an effort to boost their reputation.
The incident comes just days after millions of computers worldwide were disrupted by a bad update rolled out by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.
A vast majority of devices impacted by the CrowdStrike incident were restored within one week, but insurers predict billions in losses for the security firm’s major customers. CrowdStrike is also facing lawsuits over the incident.
Threat actors have hijacked more than 35,000 registered domains in so-called Sitting Ducks attacks that allow claiming a domain without having access to the owner’s account at the DNS provider or registrar.
In a Sitting Ducks attack, cybercriminals exploit configuration shortcomings at the registrar level and insufficient ownership verification at DNS providers.
Researchers at DNS-focused security vendor Infoblox and at firmware and hardware protection company Eclypsium discovered that there are more than a million domains that can be hijacked every day via the Sitting Ducks attacks.
Multiple Russian cybercriminal groups have been using this attack vector for years and leveraged the hijacked domains in spam campaigns, scams, malware delivery, phishing, and data exfiltration.
Sitting Ducks details
Although the issues that make Sitting Ducks possible were first documented in 2016 [1, 2] by Matthew Bryant, a security engineer at Snap, the attack vector continues to be an easier way to hijack domains than other better-known methods.
For the attack to be possible, the following conditions are required:
– registered domain either uses or delegates authoritative DNS services to a provider other than the registrar
– the authoritative name server of the record cannot resolve queries because it lacks the info about the domain (lame delegation)
– the DNS provider needs to allow claiming a domain without properly verifying ownership or requiring access to the owner’s account
Variations of the attack include partially lame delegation (not all name servers are configured incorrectly) and redelegation to another DNS provider. However, if lame delegation and exploitable provider conditions are met, the domain can be hijacked.
Prerequisites diagram Source: Infoblox
Infoblox explains that attackers can use the Sitting Ducks method on domains that use authoritative DNS services from a provider that is different from the registrar, such as a web hosting service.
If the authoritative DNS or web hosting service for the target domain expires, an attacker can simply claim it after creating an account with the DNS service provider.
The threat actor can now set up a malicious website under the domain and configure DNS settings to resolve IP address record requests to the fake address; and the legitimate owner won’t be able to modify the DNS records.
“Sitting Ducks” overview Source: Infoblox
Attacks in the wild
Infoblox and Eclypsium report that they have observed multiple threat actors exploiting the Sitting Ducks (or Ducks Now Sitting – DNS) attack vector since 2018 and 2019.
Since then, there have been at least 35,000 domain hijacking cases using this method. Typically, the cybercriminals held the domains for a short period but there were some instances where they kept them up to a year.
There have also been occurrences where the same domain was hijacked by multiple threat actors successively, who used it in their operations for one to two months and then passed it on.
GoDaddy is confirmed as a victim of Sitting Ducks attacks, but the researchers say there are six DNS providers who are currently vulnerable.
The observed clusters of activity leveraging Sitting Ducks is summarized as follows:
“Spammy Bear” – Hijacked GoDaddy domains in late 2018 for use in spam campaigns.
“Vacant Viper” – Started using Sitting Ducks in December 2019, and hijacks 2,500 yearly since then, used in the 404TDS system that distributes IcedID, and setting up command and control (C2) domains for malware.
“VexTrio Viper” – Started using Sitting Ducks in early 2020 to utilize the domains in a massive traffic distribution system (TDS) that facilitates the SocGholish and ClearFake operations.
Unnamed actors – Several smaller and unknown threat actors creating TDS, spam distribution, and phishing networks.
Defense tips
Domain owners should regularly review their DNS configurations for lame delegations, especially on older domains, and update the delegation records at the registrar or authoritative name server with proper, active DNS services.
Registrars are advised to perform proactive checks for lame delegations and alert owners. They should also ensure that a DNS service is established before propagating name server delegations.
Ultimately, regulators and standards bodies must develop long-term strategies to address DNS vulnerabilities and press DNS providers under their jurisdictions to take more action to mitigate Sitting Ducks attacks.
A Facebook malvertising campaign targets users searching for AI image editing tools and steals their credentials by tricking them into installing fake apps that mimic legitimate software.
The attackers exploit the popularity of AI-driven image-generation tools by creating malicious websites that closely resemble legitimate services and trick potential victims into infecting themselves with information stealer malware, as Trend Micro researchers who analyzed the campaign found.
The attacks start with phishing messages sent to Facebook page owners or administrators, which will send them to fake account protection pages designed to trick them into providing their login information.
After stealing their credentials, the threat actors hijack their accounts, take control of their pages, publish malicious social media posts, and promote them via paid advertising.
“We discovered a malvertising campaign involving a threat actor that steals social media pages (typically related to photography), changing their names to make them seem connected to popular AI photo editors,” said Trend Micro threat researcher Jaromir Horejsi.
“The threat actor then creates malicious posts with links to fake websites made to resemble the actual website of the legitimate photo editor. To increase traffic, the perpetrator then boosts the malicious posts via paid ads.”
Fake AI photo editor website (Trend Micro)
Facebook users who click the URL promoted in the malicious ad are sent to a fake web page impersonating legitimate AI photo editing and generating software, where they are prompted to download and install a software package.
However, instead of AI image editing software, the victims install the legitimate ITarian remote desktop tool configured to launch a downloader that automatically deploys the Lumma Stealer malware.
The malware then quietly infiltrates their system, allowing the attackers to collect and exfiltrate sensitive information like credentials, cryptocurrency wallet files, browser data, and password manager databases.
This data is later sold to other cybercriminals or used by the attackers to compromise the victims’ online accounts, steal their money, and promote further scams.
Attack flow (Trend Micro)
“Users should enable multi-factor authentication (MFA) on all social media accounts to add an extra layer of protection against unauthorized access,” Horejsi advised.
“Organizations should educate their employees on the dangers of phishing attacks and how to recognize suspicious messages and links. Users should always verify the legitimacy of links, especially those asking for personal information or login credentials.”
In April, a similar Facebook malvertising campaign promoted a malicious page impersonating Midjourney to target almost 1.2 million users with the Rilide Stealer Chrome browser extension.
A recent Google Chrome update has broken the drag-and-drop feature in the Downloads bubble that previously allowed you to drag and drop downloaded files onto any website or tab in the browser.
Google Chrome’s downloads menu originally appeared in a bar at the bottom of the browser, but this changed last year when it was replaced with a downloads bubble, which appears within the toolbar.
Google Chrome download bubble Source: BleepingComputer
As first reported by BleepingComputer, hundreds of users are now saying that the drag-and-drop feature no longer works after recent Google Chrome updates.
“Specifically files can’t be dragged into another chrome window, or be used to open a new chrome window (opening the file with chrome),” reads a post in the Google support forums.
“Dragging onto local desktop or into other programs seems to work fine. The downloads page, also works fine. Only the downloads bubble. I was able to recreate the issue by updating chrome, my current version is: 127.0.6533.73 (Official Build) (64-bit).”
In a Chromium issue found by BleepingComputer, Google Chrome engineers say reports about this bug began on July 29th and affect versions 127.0.6533.73 and 126.0.6478.185.
Google determined it was caused by a new performance-enhancing feature, ‘UIPumpImprovementsWin,’ which was rolled out to 50% of the Chrome Stable users on Sunday night.
A fix has been created by rolling back the UIPumpImprovementsWin change, which should be rolled out to users soon.
A Chinese hacking group tracked as StormBamboo has compromised an undisclosed internet service provider (ISP) to poison automatic software updates with malware.
Also tracked as Evasive Panda, Daggerfly, and StormCloud, this cyber-espionage group has been active since at least 2012, targeting organizations across mainland China, Hong Kong, Macao, Nigeria, and various Southeast and East Asian countries.
On Friday, Volexity threat researchers revealed that the Chinese cyber-espionage gang had exploited insecure HTTP software update mechanisms that didn’t validate digital signatures to deploy malware payloads on victims’ Windows and macOS devices.
“When these applications went to retrieve their updates, instead of installing the intended update, they would install malware, including but not limited to MACMA and POCOSTICK (aka MGBot),” cybersecurity company Volexity explained in a report published on Friday.
To do that, the attackers intercepted and modified victims’ DNS requests and poisoned them with malicious IP addresses. This delivered the malware to the targets’ systems from StormBamboo’s command-and-control servers without requiring user interaction.
For instance, they took advantage of 5KPlayer requests to update the youtube-dl dependency to push a backdoored installer hosted on their C2 servers.
After compromising the target’s systems, the threat actors installed a malicious Google Chrome extension (ReloadText), which allowed them to harvest and steal browser cookies and mail data.
StormBamboo attack flow (Volexity)
“Volexity observed StormBamboo targeting multiple software vendors, who use insecure update workflows, using varying levels of complexity in their steps for pushing malware,” the researchers added.
“Volexity notified and worked with the ISP, who investigated various key devices providing traffic-routing services on their network. As the ISP rebooted and took various components of the network offline, the DNS poisoning immediately stopped.”
In April 2023, ESET threat researchers also observed the hacking group deploying the Pocostick (MGBot) Windows backdoor by abusing the automatic update mechanism for the Tencent QQ messaging application in attacks targeting international NGOs (non-governmental organizations).
Almost a year later, in July 2024, Symantec’s threat hunting team spotted the Chinese hackers targeting an American NGO in China and multiple organizations in Taiwan with new Macma macOS backdoor and Nightdoor Windows malware versions.
In both cases, although the attackers’ skill was evident, the researchers believed it was either a supply chain attack or an adversary-in-the-middle (AITM) attack but weren’t able to pin down the exact attack method.
A novel Linux Kernel cross-cache attack named SLUBStick has a 99% success in converting a limited heap vulnerability into an arbitrary memory read-and-write capability, letting the researchers elevate privileges or escape containers.
The discovery comes from a team of researchers from the Graz University of Technology who demonstrated the attack on Linux kernel versions 5.9 and 6.2 (latest) using nine existing CVEs in both 32-bit and 64-bit systems, indicating high versatility.
Additionally, the attack worked with all modern kernel defenses like Supervisor Mode Execution Prevention (SMEP), Supervisor Mode Access Prevention (SMAP), and Kernel Address Space Layout Randomization (KASLR) active.
SLUBStick will be presented in detail at the upcoming Usenix Security Symposium conference later this month. The researchers will showcase privilege escalation and container escape in the latest Linux with state-of-the-art defenses enabled.
In the meantime, the published technical paper contains all the details about the attack and the potential exploitation scenarios.
SLUBStick details
One way the Linux kernel manages memory efficiently and securely is by allocating and de-allocating memory chunks, called “slabs,” for different types of data structures.
Flaws in this memory management process may allow attackers to corrupt or manipulate data structures, called cross-cache attacks. However, these are effective roughly 40% of the time and typically lead to system crashes sooner or later.
SLUBStick exploits a heap vulnerability, such as a double-free, user-after-free, or out-of-bounds write, to manipulate the memory allocation process.
CVEs successfully used in the researchers’ experiments Source: stefangast.eu
Next, it uses a timing side channel to determine the exact moment of memory chunk allocation/deallocation, allowing the attacker to predict and control memory reuse.
Using this timing information raises the success of the cross-change exploitation to 99%, making SLUBStick very practical.
Measured success rates Source: stefangast.eu
The conversion of the heap flaw into arbitrary memory read-and-write primitive is done in three steps:
Free specific memory chunks and wait for the kernel to reuse them.
Reallocate these chunks in a controlled manner, ensuring they get repurposed for critical data structures like page tables.
Once reclaimed, the attacker overwrites the page table entries, getting the ability to read and write any memory location.
SLUBStick overview Source: stefangast.eu
Real-world impact
As with most attacks involving a side channel, SLUBStick requires local access on the target machine with code execution capabilities. Furthermore, the attack requires the presence of a heap vulnerability in the Linux kernel, which will then be used to gain read and write access to the memory.
While this may make the attack appear impractical, it does introduce some benefits to attackers.
Even for attackers with code execution capabilities, SLUBStick provides the ability to achieve privilege escalation, bypass kernel defenses, perform container escapes, or use it as part of a complex attack chain.
Privilege escalation can be used to elevate privileges to root, allowing unlimited operations, while container escape can be used to break from sandboxed environments and access the host system.
Additionally, in the post-exploitation phase, SLUBStick could modify kernel structures or hooks to maintain persistence, making malware harder for defenders to detect.
Tampering with ‘/etc/passwd’ data Source: stefangast.eu
Those who want to dive deeper into SLUBStick and experiment with the exploits used by the Graz University researchers can find them in the researcher’s GitHub repository.
Video and gaming streaming service Netflix has released as open source the workflow orchestrator that its army of data scientists and analysts use every day to understand user behaviors and other large-scale data-driven trends.
The Maestro workflow orchestrator, released under an Apache 2.0 license, was designed to support hundreds of thousands of workflows and has completed up to 2 million jobs in a single day for the media company.
How Maestro Works
According to company engineers, it is highly scalable, extensible and able to meet strict service level objectives (SLO) even during spikes of traffic.
It is built on top of a range of open source technologies, namely Git, Java (21), Gradle and Docker.
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Maestro can be evoked from the cURL command line, which provides the ability to create, run, and delete a workflow and an associated batch of data. The workflow is defined in JSON, and the user’s business logic can be packaged into Docker images, Jupyter notebooks, bash scripts, SQL, Python, and other formats.
Behind the scenes, Maestro manages the entire lifecycle of a workflow, handling retries, queuing, and task distribution to compute engines. Not only does it support Directed Acyclic Graphs (DAGs) — table stakes in the AI-driven world of 2024 — but also cyclic workflows and multiple reusable patterns, through for each loop, sub workflows, and conditional branching.
“It supports a wide range of workflow use cases, including ETL pipelines, ML workflows, AB test pipelines, pipelines to move data between different storages,” a group of Netflix engineers collectively wrote in a recent blog post announcing the release. “Maestro’s horizontal scalability ensures it can manage both a large number of workflows and a large number of jobs within a single workflow.”
Birth of Maestro
Netflix is no stranger to open source software, having released many tools it developed internally as open source. System stress-testing tool Chaos Monkey was released in 2011, and inspired a whole generation of chaos testing tools. Other open source projects that Netflix has spun off include the routing gateway Zuul and the microservices routing engine Conductor, since deprecated.
Netflix first let the world know about Maestro in 2022 in a blog post that explained its origins. The orchestrator then being used, called Meson, was straining under the workloads of thousands of daily jobs, particularly around peak usage time.
“Meson was based on a single leader architecture with high availability. As the usage increased, we had to vertically scale the system to keep up and were approaching AWS instance type limits,” the engineers wrote in the 2022 post.
Worse, the workloads were expected to increase by at least 100% per year, and the sizes of the workflows were expected to grow as well.
From the start, Maestro was designed to be highly-scale and extensible. It was built on a DAG architecture, where each workflow was comprised of a series of steps. And each step can have dependencies, triggers and other conditionals. The business logic of each workflow is run in isolation, guaranteeing SLOs are met. All the services are designed to be stateless so they can be scaled out as needed.
